CHAPTER FOURTEEN

I

It took the better part of what passed as a day on Fiorina for the Marines to complete their fortifications and defensive measures for the dropship. Despite the urgency, they managed to complete the work in record time mainly by splitting into groups. While Devine and his team which consisted of Marin and Quinn set up the robot sentries around the perimeter of the ship, Addison, Daley and Yates were busily working on making certain that the hull was unapproachable by the alien hordes. Using panelling from some parts of the ship's cabins, they made certain that no entry was accessible, even if they were air vents and exhaust pipes.

These measures were taken in order to let nothing penetrate the hull of the dropship, which was their only sanctuary that could truly be deemed safe on this entire planet. As the night began to descend, there was yet to be a sign of the aliens. It was decided that the creatures were likely scouring the prison facility for the humans and it would be only a matter of time before they discovered the dropship. Hall was working feverishly on readying the dropship for lift off, so that they could at least get a safe distance from the aliens even if they could not break orbit.

At night, the weather on Fiorina grew distinctly worse. The air became a foggy sea of mist and vapour which made visibility nothing more than a thick blanket of grey. This proved to a disadvantage for they could see nothing of the outside through the monitors and since the aliens would soon be coming in force, everyone was compelled to return to the safety of the dropship once the darkness had begun to set in. Once inside the safety of the ship, the rampway leading to the hatch of the vessel was withdrawn and the entrance way was barricaded with anything they could find from the other side. Only the APC's cargo hold exit was left untouched, for they would need to get out in a hurry should anything go wrong.

Meanwhile, Maia and MacReady watched in anticipation as Foster put the finishing touches on the repairs he was conducting on his damaged android cousin that had been retrieved from the EEV, found on the trash heap of the prison. Even though there was not much to work with, Foster had taken extra care as he rewired and connected severed conduits, replaced damaged wires with new ones and drain moisture from integral systems. Maia understood his caution for he was trying to maintain as much of the android's memory core as he could.

"Almost there." He announced as he soldered another wire into place. The android was still lifeless, as it lay there on the workbench, his eyes staring emptily into space. "This should do it." Foster said finally before reaching for the power coupling feed that would give his less than perfect counterpart, the energy to live.

The android's fingers on his only arm twitched spasmodically as the energy sparked through his systems. His head jerked violently to one side before yellowish fluid, originally white, gushed from his mouth and nose. However, it was apparent that he was regaining some measure of consciousness, for his one good eye began to focus.

"Can you hear us?" Foster spoke first.

There was no response.

"Can you hear us?" He said once again, only slower this time.

All of a sudden, the corners of the android's lips began to move. "I can hear you, " he said in a very human but watery voice that was marred by a hint of electronic crackling and the moisture accumulated in its audio systems over the years.

"I'm afraid that's the best he'll be able to speak," Foster explained to Maia and MacReady. "his audio systems are filled with moisture, I got as much of it out as I could, but not all of it."

"I'm afraid he's right," the android replied. "I'm far from being up to scratch."

"You'll do fine." Maia said taking a step closer and offering him a friendly smile. "What is your name?"

"Bishop." He answered.

The name sounded familiar and she tried to place it, but couldn't. "What are you doing here on Fiorina, Bishop?" She asked instead.

"I came down in the EEV that was jettisoned by the Sulloco, a military ship."

Everyone in the room exchanged glances and Maia felt herself bubble with excitement. Of course, she realised, he was the synthetic attached to the mission on LV427! At last, here was an actual eye witness to the events on LV427 and there could not be a better source than this android before them. An android whose memory was obviously intact.

"Where's Ripley?" Bishop asked suddenly. "I'm sure she would be able to answer you questions much better than I could."

"I have no doubt she could," Maia answered earnestly, "unfortunately however, the events you remembered are thirty five years in the past, and Ripley didn't survive."

Bishop became silent as he took this in. After a moment, he finally responded, "I am sorry to hear that. Then Ripley never left Fiorina?" There was genuine sadness in his eyes as he said that.

"Ripley was here on Fiorina?" Maia declared surprised, she had always assumed that Ripley died on LV427. However, now that she knew otherwise, something inside Maia knew that Ellen Ripley was too much of a survivor to have died so easily. It was a pity that she was no longer alive, Maia would have felt it a privilege to have known her in person.

"Yes, Ripley, a young survivor of Acheron's colony, a Colonial Marine Corporal and myself were the only ones who made it of LV427 alive. Everyone else was killed in the process."

Maia took a deep breath and got to the issue at hand. "What are these aliens Bishop?" She asked. For right now, anything they could learn about the creature might help them to survive when the onslaught finally came.

Bishop paused a moment, as he accessed the memory paths not used in so long, in order to answer her question. He was surprised at how well his memory chips had survived thirty years of disuse. However, he then remembered that he had been a model built to last.

"I can tell you only what Ripley told me herself." He began, "she and her crew on board the Nostromo were awakened out of hypersleep by the on board computer which detected a signal of unknown origin emanating from Acheron, then an unsurveyed world called LV427. They believed it to be a distress signal therefore they landed on the surface of the planet and found a derelict space ship of alien origins. Judging from the state it was in, they guessed it had been there for a long time and three crew members went on board to investigate. They found that the ship's pilot, definitely a creature of unknown alien origin, to be dead. His sternum had exploded from inside.

One of the crew members found the egg chamber and brought one back to the ship. Within twenty four hours of hatching, the alien matured rapidly and killed everyone, except for Ripley who escaped in the life pod. During those twenty four hours however, she discovered that the signal had not been a distress signal but a warning and the Science Officer on board the Nostromo was a synthetic who had been assigned by the Company to retrieve the alien at all costs, the crew had been deemed expendable."

"Jesus." MacReady cursed under his breath and Maia couldn't say she was surprised. This conspiracy was older than she thought, they had wanted the alien from the very beginning and Maia her Marines were only the latest sacrifice that had been made for that purpose.

"What happened when she got back to Earth?"MacReady asked.

"She didn't get back to Earth until 57 years later." Maia explained. "It took them that long to find her and when she got back no one believed her. Why should they? If they did, then they would have to admit the Company was culpable for all those lives. Besides, by then LV427 was colonised, with no sign of alien life forms."

"Exactly," Bishop took up the commentary once again. "It would have remained that way, except a Company exec had sent the colonists on LV427, by now called Acheron, to the derelict ship and thus caused the entire colony to become infested. By the time, the military sent Ripley, myself, Mr Burke, a Company exec and a squad of Colonial Marines to investigate, it was too late. They were all dead, except for one seven year old child."

"My god." MacReady shook his head in disgust. This story was becoming worse by the minute. "What happened on Acheron, with the Marines that is." Being a Marine himself, MacReady wanted to know how it could have gone so wrong.

"They were overwhelmed," Bishop answered. "We lost nearly all the Marines in the first encounter. There were three of them left and the rest of us couldn't leave because our dropship was destroyed by the aliens when it killed the pilot during evac. All we could do was barricade ourselves in the colony complex and set up a defensive perimeter. Ripley kept us alive for a while, but the damage of the dropship to the atmosphere processors was too severed. Emergency venting threatened us with nuclear destruction, so I had no choice but to bring down the second dropship from the Sulloco by remote. On the way to meet the dropship, we lost everyone else, except for Hicks, Ripley and Newt."

At this point Yates walked into the room to check on O'Neill's progress and Maia motioned her to be silent as they further questioned Bishop about what he knew. "The alien queen managed to stow on board the dropship when we took off and returned with us to the Sulloco. That's how I came to be this way," he said with a faint smile, but he no longer had to programming to maintain it. "It was Ripley who threw her out of the airlock and saved us all."

"Hell of a woman." MacReady remarked.

"Yes she was," Bishop agreed. "She put me into the freezers, with the intention of getting me repaired when we returned to Earth. Unfortunately that never happened. While on the dropship, the alien queen had laid several eggs on the Sulloco and while we were in hypersleep, the spores attempted to penetrate the chambers. The protection grid kicked in of course and skewered. However, the creature had molecular acid for blood and it ate through the floor and started an electrical fire. The chambers were moved into the EEV and jettisoned, unfortunately the alien came with us."

"Christ." Maia said softly.

"What happened to Ripley?" Yates asked before she could.

"I know she made it to Fiorina safely, for she activated my systems so that I could interface with the EEV flight recorder since the prison facility here had none of its own." Bishop replied.

"I know she died here." Maia said with certainty. "The only surviving prisoner of Fiorina said that it was the EEV survivor they found that killed the alien here. But we don't know much else."

"You might try reading the information on the EEV's flight recorder," Bishop suggested. "I believe Ripley would have used it to gather further information and data."

"Thank you Bishop."Maia said with appreciation.

"What about the alien itself?" Foster asked for the first time. His concerns were more with the alien itself, rather than the conspiracy that surrounded it. "One of our crew members was attacked by the alien hatchling."

"You mean the spore." Bishop pointed out.

Bishop's choice of words confused Foster and he quickly stated, "if that is what you call its young."

"That is not its young." Bishop retorted.

"What do you mean?" Maia demanded suspiciously. Suddenly the fog that she had been trying to penetrate through her mind was starting to become clear and she didn't like the hollow feeling in her stomach as she came to a conclusion.

"You do understand the alien's life cycle don't you?" Bishop asked, staring at them with concern in his eyes.

"Please explain." Foster urged him.

'The alien cycle begins in its egg stage. Inside the egg is a spore, the spore reacts to external stimuli in order to emerge."

"What sort of stimuli?" Foster asked again.

"It reacts to life, its is programmed instinctively to emerge when it detects life forms in close proximity. The egg opens and the spore emerges."

That followed with what Yates had told her about O'Neill's attack Maia thought. He had gone prodding the unsealed egg and alerted the alien within it to his presence. However, there was just one more thing she had to know. "Why do you keep calling it a spore?"

"Because that is essentially what they are. It is an embryo carrier and it requires a host to nurture the embryo until it emerges from the sternum as a young alien. It does this by...."

"By attaching itself to the host's face." Maia closed her eyes as she finished what Bishop had intended to say.

"Oh my god." Yates gasped as she moved away from the and glanced at O'Neill lying on the mediscan table. "Oh my god, Richard."

"Is something wrong?" Bishop asked innocently, although he noticed that everyone in the room had suddenly gone quiet. Their faces almost ashen from silent horror. Maia was holding her face in her hands, trying to contain the outrage and revulsion that had been borne out of the realisation of the kind of death that O'Neill was facing. Suddenly it became all clear, the animals that had been transported to the surface, the manner the alien manage to infiltrate the colony on Acheron and the prison on Fiorina. It had chosen the most terrifying place to hide.

"We have a crew member with a spore attached to his face," Foster said after a while. "The spore died not long ago."

"Then the embryo has already been implanted." Bishop said grimly. "I am sorry."

"Isn't there any way to remove it?" Yates asked Bishop, hoping that there was some way, no matter how remote, to save Richard O'Neill from death.

"Once the embryo is implanted, the development of the alien is extremely rapid. Removal usually results in death."

What he could not say, Maia was sure that O'Neill was already dead. His body just didn't know it yet.

II

Maia was astonished, MacReady could say nothing, but the grim expression of outrage and fury on his face told her his feelings on the matter. Yates was utterly aghast, she stood by O'Neill's unconscious form, barely able to control her tears of shock and grief. Only Foster remained untouched by it all and she supposed he was lucky to be spared that. If Maia had been determined to survive before, she was adamant now, she wanted to get off this planet and made certain that the Weyland Yutani Corporation paid for what it had done here.

"Are you a synthetic person, Foster?" Bishop suddenly asked.

"I am, " Foster replied. "A28 - Alpha series."

"Very superior programming." The broken android complimented, without a trace of envy in his voice. "I almost thought you were human."

"Technology helps," Foster replied, "you'll see."

"No." He shook his head suddenly and drew a reaction of surprise from Foster. "I'd like a favour of you Foster, A28 - Alpha series. From one synthetic to another."

"Ask your favour." Foster replied, somewhat confused.

"I should have been deactivated long ago, when Ripley died. When everyone on the Sulloco died. I don't want to be alive because I happen to be synthetic. By rights, I should be dead too and I want to be. I went through the same fire that they did and it isn't fair that I should live because I'm an android, when the others deserved to more than I. I don't want any resurrection, no new circuits, I just want to be laid to rest, like the friends who went before me."

"But you can be repaired," Foster protested, feeling a certain amount of kinship with this Bishop android. "I could make you top of the line again."

"Foster." Maia spoke up for the first time, because she understood what Bishop was saying. Had Foster been more experienced, he would have understood too. Maia met Bishop's eyes and nodded in acknowledgement of his request. With that gaze shared between them, Bishop nodded slowly, confident that she would see that his request be honoured. "Do it." She said to Foster.

"I will disconnect you." Foster said staring Bishop in the eye. He reached for the power leads and started to pull out the connections. "Goodbye Bishop."

"Thank you." He smiled before he felt the energy leave him. Bishop closed his eyes for the last time, his memory circuits sinking into oblivion to join the crew of the Sulloco he wanted to be so much apart of.

For a long time, the four remaining beings sat in contemplative silence, trying to deal with their churning emotions caused by what they had learnt earlier on. Maia thought about Bishop and Ripley, the odyssey that they had lived through together, only to see their end on this bleak world. How through numerous odds, had managed to overcome them all only to find that in the end it was a futile gesture. Would it be the same for her and her Marines? Suddenly, something flared up in her mind, something Bishop had said about their escape from Acheron. For the first time since this whole situation had begun on Fiorina, Maia had an answer.

"Foster." She said suddenly. "Can you remote pilot the other dropship from the Sparta?"

Everyone looked up at her when they realised what she was getting at and Foster quickly nodded in response to her query. "Yes I do," he replied. "But even if I could, how will we avoid the missiles from the space station?"

Maia thought quickly and came up with a solution a moment later. "You will let the dropship free fall until its just about to enter the atmosphere. Those missiles work on heat, if you do not fire up the thrusters until the very last minute we may confuse it. By the time it reaches the atmosphere, it will be well out of range to arm."

"That's highly dangerous." Foster pointed out.

"No more dangerous than being blown to bits by heat seeking missiles." MacReady retorted.

"Exactly," Maia replied. "We just can't stay here. Those creatures are going to be coming for us. They need hosts boys and girls, they need us to reproduce and unfortunately for us, they won't stop until they get us."

"Tell me about it," MacReady looked at her and then at Foster. "The APC has a relay, it would be a good idea if you did it in there. If we have to move in a hurry, that'll be the safest place for you to be."

"Alright," Foster nodded decisively. "I'll get on it right away, the sooner we get off the planet, the better." With that the android hurried out of the room.

Once he had gone, Yates turned to Maia and MacReady. "What about Rich?"

The silence fell over the room again like a death knell and reminded both Maia and MacReady that they had another problem to deal with. Finally it was Maia who looked up at Yates and replied, "I don't know Yates, what do we do about O'Neill?"

"You're our Captain," Yates declared. "You tell us."

"Alright," Maia nodded, knowing what to do and preparing herself for the abuse she was going to get when she revealed her solution. "I say we terminate him."

"What!" The young medic exclaimed with horror on her face, horror and disgust. "What kind of reasoning is that?" She demanded, taking a threatening step towards Maia and causing MacReady to take a defensive position between the two of them.

"What do you suggest?" Maia said savagely. "Leave him as he is? You heard Bishop, he's already dead! Helping him is beyond our ability, frankly I'm praying that we're not beyond it ourselves. I can't be responsible for one life when I've got a whole other bunch to think of. Ones I can save."

"You cold bitch!" Yates spat at her angrily. "All you government types have ice water in your veins, don't you care about anything! You're disgusting!" She snorted.

"Maybe I am," Maia said neutrally. "But I am going to get out of this alive. One way or another, I am going to live and I'm going to take as many of this squad with me as I can. If that means I have to sacrifice one person, if it means I have to blow O'Neill's brains out myself, I will do it. Because that is an acceptable loss."

"How can you talk about him like he's a statistic. You act as if he's already dead!"

"He is already dead!" Maia roared, her temper getting the better of her. "Do you want that thing to shred open his guts first, before you're ready to believe it?" She glared at Yates with eyes blazing. Did this dumb kid think that she enjoyed this? "You'd better deal with this Yates, O'Neill is as good as dead and I have too many things to deal with right now than endure the hysterical ravings of someone who should remembered that she is a Colonial Marine!"

All of a sudden, they heard the sound of a cough. No one spoke as they turned to where the sound was coming from. O'Neill was lying on the table, but he was no longer conscious, he was coughing hard and showed no signs of having heard the conversation that was raging heatedly only seconds before. The three of them hurried over to the young private, who seemed to be coming out of some kind of a fog.

"What's all the damn racket about?" He managed to say.

Maia looked at Yates and wondered, how the hell they were going to tell him.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I

Maia said nothing as she stood back and watched the rest of the Marines enter the room less than twenty minutes after O'Neill's revival. Other than herself, Yates, Foster and MacReady had any idea of what was to come each minute that passed seemed an eternity of anticipation as she waited for the terrible alien progeny to make its arrival. O'Neill had no knowledge of this, he was merely glad to have awakened from a terrible dream with no suspicions of anything that he had seen was real.

O'Neill remained seated on the mediscan table, talking and laughing with friends in good humour. He seemed none the worse for wear, with no outward signs showing anyone that within his body, things were far from normal.

"Good to see you're alright, Irish." Quinn remarked, patting him on the shoulder. "We thought you're messed up good."

"So did I." O'Neill groaned, rubbing his forehead and eyes as he shook the comatose condition out of himself. Suddenly, he reached for his stomach and massaged it gently, a gesture which was not lost on MacReady or Maia who quickly exchanged glances when that happened. "What happened after I went out?" He inquired. All he remembered was a terrible dream about being smothered, he had no idea how he had come to be in the dropship.

"We lost a few people." MacReady replied. "The aliens came in full force and the Sarge, Clark, Hawkins, Jankowski and Doran didn't make it."

"Jesus." O'Neill exclaimed softly, remembering those comrades and finding the discovery of their loss had left a hollow feeling within him. "How bad was it?"

"Pretty bad," Addison took a deep breath, trying to find some way to put that nightmarish encounter with the alien into words that would sound remotely plausible. "The things that came at us were bigger than a man, they were the biggest fucking bugs I've ever seen."

"But I remember seeing a dead one," O'Neill spoke up. "They weren't very big."

"The ones that attacked us sure were," MacReady answered, trying to keep the fact out his mind that the one O'Neill had seen was a spore, not unlike the one that had impregnated him. "Bled acid for blood and went through our armour like you've never seen. Extremely virulent xenomorphs."

"So what happened to me?" He inquired.

MacReady looked at Maia, hoping she could help him in answering O'Neill. Somehow it seemed too cruel to tell him, especially when there was nothing they could do to help. However, they could not let him go through it with no knowledge of what was to come either. Their exchange went unnoticed by the other Marines and finally it was Foster who gave them a temporary reprieve, by making a move to usher everyone out of the room, with the excuse that he needed to do some more tests on O'Neill.

As they were slowly filtering out of the small area that was the Sick Bay, Maia began to notice that O'Neill was beginning to sweat in rivulets. Large beads of salted water ran down his forehead and down his chest and the private himself seemed baffled by this. O'Neill wiped away the moisture off his brow, confused at why he suddenly felt so flushed and warm. A tiny creeping pain, began to make itself felt in the area of his sternum and he massaged the skin to soothe, but to no avail.

"Foster," he said suddenly. "I don't feel so good."

At that, everyone froze in their tracks, even the Marines who didn't know the implications of O'Neill's symptoms. Yates looked at Foster helplessly, as MacReady and Maia stepped back against the wall, unable to do anything but watch. Foster went to O'Neill immediately, showing no signs of distress so that he would not cause any undue worry to the private.

"What do you feel?" The android asked calmly, his face betraying nothing and revealed confidence.

"I don't know," O'Neill replied, feeling the tightening in his chest grow more acute. "It feels weird. Something really tickling me in there." He pointed to his sternum.

"Let me see." Foster ordered, placing his hands on the human's chest to examine it.

"Christ!" He gasped out loud, the pain creasing over his face even more clearly now. The other Marines began to draw closer, feeling a certain amount of fear themselves as they saw O'Neill descend into his doomed state. "Do something Foster," he cried out, "this is really starting to hurt!" His fingers dug into the gurney hard as Yates approached him. She wrapped her hands around his to offer him comfort, but she knew it was futile, even though she refused to admit it.

"God!" He shouted one last time before he fell back on the table suddenly and began going into violent convulsions. Foster and Yates leapt into action and it took all their strength to hold O'Neill's writhing body down. The Marines merely watched horrified, not knowing what to make of this sudden turn of events. If only they knew, Maia thought.

O'Neill's violent struggles overwhelmed even Yates and Foster, as he rolled off the steel table and fell down on the floor. His legs were thrashing about in agony as he succumbed deeper into the intensity of pain. His arms and head was flaying about in all directions, hampering the efforts of the Foster and Yates to get him back on the table. Now Quinn and Marin had joined in, grabbing the private's legs, even though they were kicking out furiously.

"Foster help him!" Someone screamed and Maia assumed it to be Quinn.

He was beyond help, Maia thought. Beyond anything.

All of a sudden, O'Neill's chest erupted with blood. Flesh and fluid, sprayed out in all directions, in one terrible moment. Everyone let him go, frozen by what they had seen, as he remained still for a few seconds. Then as if the frame of a picture had been put into motion again, O'Neill snapped back to life, making his reanimation more potent with a scream of agony that cut through all their ears. Maia tried to drive away that agonising scream out of her mind, wishing that it would happen quickly, but finally deciding that she was not going to wait any longer or let O'Neill suffer any more.

By now, O'Neill's screams had turned into guttural shrieks of agony. He was convulsing so violently, that it took almost all of Quinn's and Foster's combined strength to hold his down. Even Marin's and Yates grips had weakened and the Marines cries for Foster to do something no longer went heeded. Foster made an attempt to examine her, but it was more or less a futile gesture. Unable to sit by any longer, Maia made her way through the crowd surrounding the private, while unholstering her sidearm.

"Help him!" Yates was tugging at Foster's shoulder, urging his to do something, when Maia yanked her back hard and shoved her out of the way.

"Stand aside." She ordered Foster quietly.

The android rose his eyes to meet hers and he asked, "what are you going to do?"

"Stand aside." She repeated herself firmly, not wanting to lose her resolve.

The android let go of O'Neill who was still screaming and writhing about in a hell only he could experience, and none could imagine. Foster stepped aside, admits the confusion of Marin and Quinn who were still holding onto the private. As Maia stood before O'Neill, watching him cry out in agony, watching that red smear on his chest grow bigger, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, before taking aim and firing one bullet through the centre of his skull.

The gun shot echoed through the room as it cut short O'Neill's screams and he fell back on the floor, blood pouring out of the hole that had erupted from the back of his neck, forming a thick, ugly puddle. For a moment, no one said a word, no one could believe what she had done. Maia herself, hadn't believed she had been forced to do something so cold blooded, but she had no choice. The thing was going to tear him apart before it emerged and Maia wanted to spare O'Neill that pain.

The Marines however, when they had regained their composure reacted more than violently. Quinn turned to Maia and lunged for her, throwing her back against the floor hard. The gun in Maia's hand fell clumsily out of her reach, sliding across the smooth floor to the base of the opposite wall. Quinn's full weight made her impact against the floor hard, and for a moment, she was dazed.

"You crazy bitch!" He shouted, "what the fuck did you do?"

"Get off me!" Maia returned angrily once her head had stopped swimming. It had been bad enough having to do what no one else would have done, to put O'Neill out of his misery, without having to endure this as well. She had to get her gun back, this grisly task was not over yet. She owed it to O’Neill to complete it!

MacReady moved to help her when suddenly, he noticed that O'Neill's body was moving. Everyone else was so preoccupied with Quinn's struggle with the Captain, that they hadn't notice. For a second, he stood there in grim fascination, watching an unnatural twitching under O'Neill's bloody skin. Only when another convulsion took over the dead man's body, did MacReady snap out of it and alert the others.

"Hey!" He cried out. "He's fucking moving!"

Everyone except Quinn who was still struggling with Maia, turned to face O'Neill's dead body on the floor. Once again, the skin on O'Neill's chest heaved with a power of its own, stretching the flesh covering it to extreme limits. Then without warning, O'Neill's chest exploded outwards, spraying them all with blood and pieces of flesh and bone. Yates was bathed in it, face and all. She let out a scream that was loud enough to distract Quinn so that Maia was able to throw him off her.

The creature that emerged from the ragged hole of what was once O'Neill's chest, was covered with blood and entangled in the remains of his intestines. It pivoted its head, knowing that the room was full even though it had no eyes to see with, before hissing at them with a mouthful of razor sharp teeth. Maia stared at it for a full second before she jumped into action, scrambling towards her gun.

"Jesus Christ!" Addison exclaimed. He was the first one who actually managed to speak.

Turning to the sound of the corporal's voice, the alien hatchling hissed loudly again before springing out of O'Neill's chest with its coiled tail. No one stopped it as it hurried away from the startled humans who had witnessed its birth, trailing O'Neill's entrails behind it as it went. Maia grabbed her gun and ran after it. However, the alien had size and speed to its advantage. By the time Maia even raised her gun to fire at it, the alien had disappeared out the door and into the darkness of the corridor outside.

"Fuck!" Maia swore, the gun still pointed at the door. With a sigh of frustration, she lowered her weapon, knowing that the alien creature was long gone.

It was gone and loose on the dropship.

II

"Man, oh man," Addison groaned, "it laid a fucking egg inside of him."

Time had done nothing to lessen the impact of what they had seen. Almost twenty minutes had passed since this alien's birth and the Marines were still trying to cope with the obscenity of O'Neill's death. Where it had been urgent for them to survive prior to the episode, now it was utterly imperative that they did not fall into alien hands. If what had been done to O'Neill was what the aliens had planned for them, then a large number of the Marines were opting to die instead.

"It'll do the same to all of us!" Daley responded, not making the situation any better. "That's why they're after us! They want us all to be fucking egg carriers."

"Shut up." MacReady ordered. Like Maia, he didn't want the Marines to panic, because they all needed cool heads to live through this and at the moment, that didn't seem likely if people like Daley sounded off every second. He glanced at Maia who was standing silently against the nearby wall, having said nothing since the alien had made its hasty departure. Even though Foster had explained to the Marines why she had killed O'Neill, MacReady suspected that the Captain herself didn't feel exonerated for taking another human's life the way she had.

"You're not in charge around here!" Daley snorted in return in typical arrogance.

"Well I am," Devine interceded with uncharacteristic fire, "so shut the fuck up."

Daley felt silent, although it was obvious he was unhappy at being spoken to that way. However, while it was one thing to openly defy a corporal who couldn't do very much when he was a pilot, getting the order from a Lieutenant was another thing altogether and Daley wasn't about to lock horns with an officer. Especially if it anger Captain Sanjay enough to intervene.

"Sir," Devine looked up at Maia once the dust had settled from his confrontation with Daley. "What do we do now?'

Maia took a deep breath and realised that it was time for her to take reins of the situation again. Devine was improving his command stature in leaps and bounds but he wasn't ready to get them out of trouble yet. Right now, the Marines needed her and she wasn't about to disappoint them. "For starters, we get that damn thing. Our priority right now, is to find and then get rid of it. We know from experience how big they get and even one is going to be a handful, we also know that they grow fast and I don't want to count on it remaining small for much longer."

No one spoke because everyone agreed with her. There were no jokes or wise cracks, even idle chatter going about the room. Everyone knew the gravity of her words, and they knew the savagery of the creature they were dealing with. They were the zebras and the alien currently having free run of their ship would grow into a lion very quickly.

"Devine, I want you to pair everyone off, arm them with motion trackers and go through the ship. I want every bulkhead, every vent and every room in the dropship checked. Hall, you and Daley continue the repairs, when we deal with the alien, we're going to be leaving this place. Devine, this is a search and destroy op, when you find the alien, I want it killed. Destroy it or its going destroy us."

"Yes Sir." Devine nodded purposefully.

"Addison, you and Foster meet me in the APC." Maia said looking at the comtech. "Foster, I want you to begin prepping the dropship on the Sparta for departure and Addison, I'll tell you what I want when I get there."

With that she dismissed them and watched them leave the small confines of the Sick Bay. Predictably, MacReady held back until all his fellow Marines had left and they were alone in the room. He came up to her with an expression on his face she didn't recognise, nor could she fathom. Maia wondered what was on the corporal's mind. Was he also having difficulty understanding what she had done to O'Neill? Maia hoped not, because she didn't have the energy to keep explaining herself.

However, when he spoke, Maia once again learnt, how it was often possible to be surprised by this Corporal of the Colonial Marines. He looked straight at her and asked, "are you okay Sir?" There was genuine concern in his eyes borne out of the realisation of how hard it must have been for her to end O'Neill's life.

For a moment, she didn't know how to answer him. Was she alright? After standing by helplessly and watching some kid have his insides torn out, before forcing to end his agony with a bullet from her own gun? Could she honestly say that it didn't hurt her? No, she couldn't because it hurt like hell. She had been called on to carry many tasks during her career, but she neither liked nor cared for the role of executioner. "I'm fine," she managed to answer when she had composed herself a little. "Its part of the job, Mac."

"No it isn't." He looked at her sharply. "You're our leader and our Captain, you shouldn't have had to do it. I know it had to be done, but no one should have had to do it. Those of us, who couldn't admire you for being able to. O'Neill was in pain and you gave him a merciful death, I know its not much of a consolation, but we need you too much for me to let you get eaten up by guilt."

"How did a grunt get to be so wise?" She met his gaze with a faint smile. Even though the pain had not lessened, MacReady's words did comfort her as he intended, even if it was a little bit.

"You know us," he smiled as he turned to join his comrades, "We Marines are prepared for everything."

************

When Maia arrived at the APC, Foster was already concentrating his effort on beginning the preparation of the second dropship on board the Sparta, for launch. The android sat at the controls in the corner of the APC and didn't seemed to notice even when she arrived. He was much too involved in carrying out the delicate procedure. Addison on the other hand was idly waiting for her and reacted when she entered the APC.

"What's the op, Sir?" He asked as she walked towards him, at his place by the APC's computers.

"I want to see all the information you accessed on the flight recorder of the EEV." She answered, sitting down next to him.

"No problem," Addison swivelled around in his chair to face the console screen in front of them. It took the comtech several minutes to transfer from his portable recorder, all the information he had retrieved from the EEV to load it onto the APC's computer terminal so that they could view it. When the information was loaded, it announced itself ready for viewing by creating a sparkle of static on the screen in front of them.

"Here it is." Addison announced.

The footage which appeared in the screen before them had clearly deteriorated during the years, which was hardly surprising considering that much of its past thirty years had been spent on the top of a rubbish heap. However, it was still in reasonably good condition for them to view, with a certain amount of clarity which was more than Maia had expected from it. The image revealed the interior of the hypersleep chamber of the Sulloco, which contained numerous hypersleep chambers. Of them, only four were occupied and Maia could see that Ellen Ripley lay asleep in the capsule at the furthest end. Even the android Bishop was there, he had been wrapped in protective plastic after the encounter with the alien queen had left him halved. He still looked a damn sight better than when they had seen him last, Maia decided.

The sleepers were oblivious to anything, trapped in the amber of drug induced slumber while they believed they were journeying home. Suddenly, there was a flutter of movement at the corner of the screen, something small and familiar that was quickly running across the floor, one after the other. Maia's stomach hollowed when she spoke, "freeze the frame."

Addison complied immediately and the picture held still and unmoving.

"See if you can enhance one of those things." She asked, even though she had a fair idea she knew what they were.

The comtech did so without question and Maia found herself starting at the enhanced frame, which was clearly defined and unarguably an alien spore. Maia had counted three of these spores in the EEV pod and silently made a mental note of what had happened to them. As Bishop said, one had been skewered when it tried to penetrate the capsule, the protection grid protecting the capsules integrity would have killed the creature the minute it had tried to break through. The second one had made it all the way to Fiorina 361 and had seeded itself to become the alien that devastated the prison and slaughtered its inmates. But there was a third and Maia found herself wondering what had happened to it. Could that third alien explain what had taken place on Fiorina?

Maia watched the alien that met its end at the hands of the protection grid, attempt to force its way into the capsule of the unnamed child only to meet its inevitable death as expected. The two humans watched as its acidic blood sprayed all over the floor of the hypersleep chamber floor and quickly reacted with the steel. Hissing loudly as the metal melted away and the deadly fluid penetrated the electrics housed underneath it. Before long, all that was left of it was a crater in the middle of the floor, with corrosive gases rising from its innards.

Klaxons began sounding as the Sulloco detected the danger to its ability to take its sleeping passengers home. Huge clamps began to move the occupied capsules into the EEV amidst a fog of thick smoke and rising flames. The alien's blood had caused an electrical fire. Within minutes, the humans were deposited into the EEV and the emergency escape pod detached itself from the Sulloco, leaving the ship far behind to meet its own destiny as it continued on its own.

Meanwhile within the EEV, the craft had taken on two unexpected passengers and an alien spore made its appearance on the screen once again. Having learnt its lesson this time, it made its way to another capsule, and instead of attempting to breach the security of the capsule, secreted its acidic fluid and created a hole in the strong glass. Once the passage way was large enough, the alien spore slipped inside to the unknowing victim that lay asleep, oblivious to everything. The capsule it had entered, belonged to Ellen Ripley.

Maia couldn't watch, but somehow she felt compelled to. Finally, she understood what Ellen Ripley's fate had been. She had died the way that O'Neill had died, in agony and in blood, birthing the obscenity she had fought so hard against. It seemed almost cruel and it was. No matter how much she had struggled, no matter what she had done, her fate was sealed, almost from the moment she had met the alien for the first time in LV427.

There had never been any question that she would escape. Because she wouldn't.

"Fuck!" Addison cursed as he saw the alien impregnating Ellen's Ripley with its evil seed. Maia said nothing, she was beyond feeling now, all she felt was this numbing anger and the desire to not only avenge herself but for this poor woman whom she had never met, but felt she shared a kinship with.

The flight recorders requiem to the dead continued, showing the spore dying once it had carried out its singular biological function in its short existence. It left Ripley with no idea of the dying to come and Maia wondered what it must have been like when Ripley finally learnt the truth. Addison speeded up the tape when they found nothing had happened after the alien had died, at least for awhile. When he finally brought the tape to normal speed, he and Maia witnessed the devastating crash on the EEV on Fiorina.

The impact had been hard, a support beam broke lose with tremendous force and hurled itself straight through the capsule carrying the corporal. The beam impaled him through the chest with such force that Maia assumed death for him was near instantaneous. It was doubtful he ever came out of hypersleep to know what hit him. Water began to seep into the EEV and Maia guessed they must have crashed in the ocean near the prison. The tube holding the little girl began to fill with water, the protection grid unable to stop the influx of water due to damage to its systems. Within seconds, she was completely immersed in water. The child struggled for a few minutes, her attempts to live were subconscious and so was her death. She had never come out of hypersleep to experience her demise. Which was just as well, Maia thought.

The next frames were a flurry of activity with the arrival of a rescue team, who discovered the dead and the lone survivor, being Ripley. She was removed from the EEV along with the corpses of her two dead human companions. After that, there was another moment of inactivity, when all the humans had gone and the EEV was empty, except for one lone occupant.

A large dog entered the EEV, its canine senses had alerted it to something of interest. Maia didn't even have to guess what would happen next. The alien which had gone unnoticed by the rescue team, finally found the host that would carry its seed. She wondered which of the two aliens emerged first. She knew that the prisoner who survived Fiorina had said that the EEV survivor had killed the alien. That meant it was Ripley and therefore, she who had been impregnated first, had not yet given birth to her alien seed when she killed the other. If so, how could that be? The alien grew fast, O'Neill's death had been proof of that.

The next scene showed the EEV rocking precariously before it fell down on the ground loudly, tilting slightly once it had recovered from the impact. "Probably when they put it on the dump," Addison commented, although Maia's eyes were fixed on the screen, because something new was taking place.

Ripley staggered into the EEV with another man. Her face seemed pale, even through the deteriorated images of the film, that much was certain. She made her way to the mediscan table in the far corner of the room and lay down on it. The conversation between the two went on to show that Ripley had discovered that she was carrying an alien within her and the reason it had yet to hatch was because it was a queen; an egg layer.

Suddenly, the entire picture went static, cutting off the scene they were viewing.

"What the hell." Addison remarked and was about to reach for the controls when a new scene emerged.

Ellen Ripley's face stared at them. She had rigged the EEV's flight recorder so that it would focus directly upon her and nothing else. Maia stared back at her, somewhat horrified by Ripley's haggard appearance. Her hair had been cut short, almost to the scalp, which wasn't unusual, considering the problem of lice that existed in prisons such as Fiorina. However, there was a hollowness in her eyes that was more than just physical. The pain and the misery she had suffered had created its own lines in her face and its own grey in her eyes.

"This is Ellen Ripley," she began speaking, it was a voice of a strong woman, defeated. "I am the last survivor of the Commercial Ore Carrier, the Nostromo. My crew are dead and I soon will be too. I don't know if anyone will ever hear this recording and even if they do, whether they will care, but I'm going to die soon and I'll damned if I do without speaking my peace. It's the only chance I'll ever have. Someone has got to stop them because they are fucking insane and they will destroy the world if they're aren't stopped. I am talking about the Weyland Yutani Corporation, or if you like, the Company.

Before I tell you my story, you must understand the alien to realise the threat they pose to mankind. It begins its life as an egg, awaiting some helpless person to find it, before the spore within the egg emerges and impregnates him or her. I used the word impregnate because the spore releases an embryo into the host and then dies. When the embryo reaches maturity, it emerges from the victim's sternum, while they are helplessly watching. The adult aliens are about six to seven feet tall. They possess remarkable adaptive traits to survive in its environment. It takes military grade armour piercing shells to penetrate the skin and even then it isn't easy. They move fast for their size and they are incredibly strong. They possess no eyes or ears as we can tell, but they pick up human scent with remarkable ease. They are capable of surviving in the vacuum of space and are afraid of nothing.

When the alien is fully matured, it begins building a nest and is capable of laying an egg on its own. Although it is limited to one egg, that egg can be a queen and that brings a whole new perspective to the situation. A queen when matured is almost fifteen feet in height and while the alien drones are not very smart, the queen show incredible intelligence. The one we encountered on LV427 chose to build her next under the nuclear coolant reactors of the colony, ensuring that it was the one place we could not destroy her with bombs or grenades. She is capable of laying thousands of eggs and each of them requires a host to nurture the alien embryo. On Earth, if such creatures get loose, there would be no way of stopping them. They kill on sight and if they don't kill, they immobilise their victims to be hosts. Every alien is capable of laying an egg that is a potential queen. This is what the Company thinks it can control. I hope saner minds don't feel the same way or else Earth is in for a lot of shit.

My crew and I were deemed expendable by the Company when we discovered the alien on LV427. They even substituted our science officer with a synthetic so that they could make sure we didn't survive well enough to kill their precious specimen. I was lucky enough to escape with my life, but the others, Cain, Dallas, Lambert, Parker and Brett were not. To the Company, our lives were always secondary to the acquisition of the alien.

When I returned to Earth, I warned them about the alien. How we had found it in a derelict space ship that was not indigenous to LV427, but they did nothing. One of them even sent out the colonists residing on the planet to investigate the ship, with full knowledge of what would happen when they found the alien eggs. Because of their greed, 20 families, making up 157 colonists died on LV427, as hosts for more aliens. When I arrived with a team of Colonial Marines and a company exec, there was nothing left except bodies and aliens. The Colonial Marines fought hard to stop them, but ultimately they failed too.

I am now on Fiorina 361, a prison facility. Those who came with me, who survived LV427, Hicks, Bishop and Newt are dead. The alien is here, it has killed numerous people already and I have found out that I myself am infected. It seems I'm carrying a queen and when she emerges, will be able to create thousands more like the one that's running around loose here. I am not going to let that happen. I asked one of the prisoners to kill me, to terminate my life before this thing emerges and destroys everything. I'll help him kill the alien if he'll kill me and the queen inside of me. It's a fair exchange. Too many people have died already, too many good people. All because of the Company's greed. As I speak, they're on their way here to collect the specimen I'm carrying, I'm going to rob them of that prize. I have a feeling they're likely to kill everyone here just to keep their secret, so I'm going to solve that problem before it arises. All my friends, Newt, Hicks, Clemens, the prisoners of Fiorina, the Colonial Marines, Bishop, the colonists of LV427, Dallas, Cain, Brett, Lambert, Parker and Ash are dead. This is Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo."

With that, the recording came to an end and for a long while, no one spoke even though the APC was cackling with the sound of static from the end of the tape. Maia's heart ached for that brave woman who had died here so long ago. A woman whose pain she understood, whose courage was unparalleled. She deserved much better than to die the way she had.

"The fucking Company." Addison remarked. His face showed empathy towards Ellen Ripley, he had been touched the way she had. "That woman deserved better than this." He remarked looking Maia in the eye.

"Yes she did." Maia agreed. "But its not going to be in vain, none of it." Maia said firmly. "She left this message for someone to hear and we've heard it and now I'm going to make certain that the right people hear it when we get back to Earth. Addison, I want you to make a copy of the tape and keep it on yourself in case anything happens. When we get back to Earth, Ellen Ripley is going to make her case before the United Nations of Earth and she will be heard."

"Fucking A." Addison nodded firmly, liking the idea himself.

Whether or not she knew it, Ellen Ripley was going to provide the nails for the coffin belonging to the Weyland Yutani Corporation.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

I

A short time later after uncovering Ellen Ripley's message in the EEV flight recorder tapes, Maia and Addison joined the search for the alien loose on their ship, while Foster attended to the business of bringing down the dropship to Fiorina so that they could escape this nightmarish planet. Maia found herself teamed up with MacReady as they explored the maintenance sector of dropship, down in its deeper bowels. Below the main deck, all was dark, with the only illumination coming from the small lantern on MacReady's helmet. It was falling on night on Fiorina and the temperature was starting to drop, making Maia remind herself again to get something warmer to wear when the opportunity presented itself.

As they moved through the dark passages, both of them had to be careful not to trip over any debris that might lay in their path, because of the crash. The missile had caused considerable damage and not until Maia had seen it for herself, had she realised how lucky they had been to be able to land in one piece at all.

"See anything?" MacReady asked her.

Maia looked at the motion tracker she was carrying and found nothing to indicate that the alien was down here with them. "Not a thing." She replied before continuing on ahead.

"Tell me something." He spoke once again.

"What?" She replied distracted, her attention still on the tracker and the results had not changed.

"How does one become a UNE Officer?"

Maia smiled faintly, wondering if he could see her smile through the darkness. "You don't quit do you?" She remarked before letting out a sigh and deciding that she wouldn't refuse him an answer. "First of all, you start off by graduating top of your class at Cambridge, specialising in languages and engineering."

"Cambridge?" He declared impressed. "I'm a NYU guy myself."

Now it was Maia's turn to be impressed. "You're an NYU graduate?" She turned to him in surprise. No wonder he was so much harder to fool than the rest of these Marines. She had always suspected him to be different, since he displayed more intelligence than most of the soldiers she had ever met. "Whatever are you doing here as a Marine Corporal? You should be in OCS."

"I asked your life story first." He pointed out, shrugging uncomfortably when she asked her questions.

"Okay," she laughed deciding to relent first, because she was genuinely curious about his origins as well. "When I graduated, I got a letter from UNE, and when I went down there Max threw me a pitch telling me how good it would be and how I would be contributing to the security of the planet."

"The same Max you were talking to earlier?" He inquired.

"Yeah," she nodded slowly, not wanting to deal with that particular hurt yet. "Max told me that I'd be wasting my talents as Company corporate raider and offered me a shot at the Security Division. I took the job because I didn't want to work for Weyland Yutani myself and now here I am."

"About to be slaughtered." MacReady retorted.

"Very funny," Maia threw him a look. "What about you? How does an NYU graduate end up being a Marine grunt?"

MacReady shrugged and looked away, trying to examine his own life's actions. "I don't know, college was fine, but when it was over, I still didn't know what I wanted. I spent a year working for the Company shuffling papers before I got sick of it and then one day I was watching the vid and saw an army recruitment ad for the Colonial Marines and thought why not? Best decision I ever made too," he replied before pausing to look around at his surroundings, "til now."

"We're not done yet Mac," Maia said firmly and with confidence that surprised even herself. "We are getting out of here alive and when I hit Earth, there's going to be a day of reckoning for the Company and for my dear friend Max."

"You two were really close huh?" He asked quietly.

"Too close." Maia retorted with a hint of sadness. "Too close for people in our line of work. But it looks like I overestimated our relationship by a country mile."

"Will you stay with UNE, when you get back?" He inquired, for she sounded quite disillusioned with her work and he could hardly blame her. When one's own superior throws you to the wolves, one can get quite deflated.

"I don't know." Maia replied, thinking about it for the first time. She knew she would need time to get over this mess if she even survived to get to Earth, not to mention the plans she had for Max. However, now that she thought about it, she knew that this had left a mark on her that time would never heal. "I may stay or I may retire. Contrary to what Max said, this job does pay goo and there is always work in the private sector that doesn't involve the Company. I've got a house in Maine, I might hole up there for a while and enjoy the lobsters." She chuckled before checking the motion tracker once again, and once again, it showed a clear signal which indicated they were still alone.

"Captain," he said suddenly with a tone to his voice that Maia didn't recognise. She hated it whenever he did that. "You may not like this and at this point, I don't really care. I promised myself that if I'm going to die here, I not going until I do this first."

Maia was in mid turn towards him when suddenly she felt his arms around her waist, pulling her towards him. She didn't have time to react when she felt herself pressed up against the hard body armour he was wearing. Without saying a word, MacReady leaned over and pressed his lips against hers with a passion that was completely unexpected. For a moment, she became lost in the warmth of his lips, unable to deny the feelings in her this sudden intimacy was provoking. And when she became aware, Maia decided she really didn't care either. Opening her mouth up to him, they stood there for a long while, in the dark, kissing each other with a passion that neither could believe or deny.

For during those precious few minutes, there was no Max, no alien horde trying to kill them, no Company to have put them in this position, there wasn't even an Ellen Ripley, there was just the two of them, finding comfort in this strangest of places. She held on to him, unable to pull away because her body felt so warm and secure next to him. When they finally parted, Maia looked up at MacReady with a smile she couldn't suppress.

"That was nice Mac." She replied.

"I thought so." He answered. "If we ever get out of this Captain," he looked down and then at her again. "Don't be a stranger. My life's much too dull without you around." He added with a twinkle of mischief in his eyes.

"You can't count on it." Maia replied and was surprised because she actually meant it.

*************

Meanwhile on the other end of the ship, Private Hall and Daley were working laboriously on the damaged engine of their dropship. While the rest of the Marines hunted for the alien creature, the two pilots had been assigned to repair their dropship as best as possible, so that they could get out of the hive's immediate vicinity. The repairs had been going slowly with Hall starting to think that she was engaged in a losing battle. There was just so much damage, perhaps even beyond her ability to repair it, however, she knew she had no choice. They were dead unless they got out of here.

"Anything on the tracker?" Hall asked as she was tightening some screws on the engine block.

"No." Daley took a quick look a the motion tracker and declared with a frown. "Nothing at all." The co-pilot was not at all happy that he was left here to languish in the assistance of repairs, when an alien was running around loose. He wanted to be in the company of the others, perhaps Marin or Quinn, with smart guns that were more formidable than the pulse rifle sitting on the floor next to him.

"Move your ass." Hall barked, "you're supposed to have the dents out of those valves already." She said impatiently. Time was of the essence, didn't he know that?"

"Fuck you." Daley snapped.

However, when Hall turned back to give him an icy glare, it kicked started him back to work again. She was a formidable woman when she wanted to be and she could certainly give him trouble if he didn't do his share of the work. He picked up the valve and started hammering it with the small hammer before Hall turned back to her own work. However, she had not look away a second when suddenly, the tracker sounded.

"What is it?" Hall demanded, reaching for the sidearm in her holster.

"Something's coming." Daley replied as he stared at the screen in fright.

"Where?" She demanded.

"I don't know!" He cried out, "I can' read this thing well."

She groaned in disgust and started for him when suddenly, something fell to the floor. Instinctively, Hall pulled out her gun to fire when her senses returned and she saw that the object that had fallen was too small and intangible to be their alien. However, in the background, the tracker still squealed its warning.

"What is it?" He asked nervously.

"I don't know." Hall took a cautious step forward before kneeling down to inspect the find. On closer observation, she prodded it with her gun and found it to be a wet, sticky mess. Lifting it off the ground gently, it seemed almost like latex, translucent and covered with slime. Hall studied it closely, uncertain of what it was they were looking at.

"What is it!" Daley cried out again, looking around them nervously. The lighting in the dropship was minimal in the lower decks and he could see nothing to explain why the tracker was sounding off so frantically.

Hall flicked his gun and flung the sheath away, before wiping it against her overalls. "I don't know." She said honestly, shaking her head with a frown. Hall looked at the slimy puddle on the floor and then looked upwards to see where it had come from. She really couldn't see anything through the darkness, except for the faint silhouette of conduits and piping.

Hall didn't even see the shape that moved behind her with agility and stealth that was so utterly quiet that nothing was heart at all. Daley saw it first, but was so paralysed with fear that he could only look upon it with choked terror that was no good to Hall since he could neither open his mouth to speak or even warn her. All that he was capable of doing was staggering back impotently.

"What's wrong with you?" Hall asked when she saw Daley forcing himself against a nearby wall. However anything else she was going to say became lost in her throat when she heard a loud hissing she couldn't identify. She turned around slowly, almost fearfully as her breath caught in her throat.

It stood more than a foot or two higher than her, its dark body glistening in resin and other fluids. The elongated head raised itself to its full height, revealing teeth that were razor sharp and capable of rendering human flesh apart easily. Hall never even had time to fire. The moment she began to move her hand to fire, the creatures secondary jaws shot out of his mouth and caught the veteran pilot straight through her forehead and tore her skull to shreds. All she could do was utter one final scream which was heard by the fleeing Daley, who had turned on his heels and ran, leaving her with the beast.

"It was huge!" Daley told his companions several minutes later, when they had all gathered in the hold of the APC. "It was bigger than a man!" The co-pilot related his tale, his voice trembling with fear and pure terror as he spoke. Fear mainly because he had left Hall to fend for herself, he had been unable to even warn her and terror because it could have easily been him that was dead.

"It grows fast." Maia said grimly.

"That's an understatement." MacReady retorted. He was angry that Hall had been killed, Alicia Hall whom he had been friends with for as long as he could remember his time in the Marine corp. Suddenly a thought occurred to him and he turned to Daley. "What the hell were you doing when she was being ripped to shred?"

"I was getting ready to fire," he said swallowing hard. "It all happened so fast." However it was obvious he was lying and MacReady knew how to prove it.

"Oh yeah?" MacReady glared at him. "Then where's your goddamn gun?"

"I must have dropped it!" He protested. "There was nothing I could do anyway!"

"You gutless fuck! You left her didn't you?" Quinn roared before lunging at him. However MacReady positioned himself between them and allowed the others to pull Quinn back and calm him down.

"Enough of this!" Maia shouted, forcing herself to intervene. She too was disgusted at Daley's actions, but this fighting between themselves was not very productive. In fact it was downright fool hardy.

"This asshole has got to pay!" The smart gunner yelled defiantly, full of self righteous rage. He shared MacReady's feelings towards Hall as well and even though he was less restrained, he too wanted justice.

"He will." Maia replied icily, glaring at Daley with disgust. "But not now. Not here."

Daley recoiled in fear, realising the full magnitude of what he had done and the consequences when he got home to Earth. His comrades looked at him with revulsion and suspicion, seeing him for what he truly was, a whining and gutless coward who had let one of them die. Quinn looked like he wanted to kill him and so did Marin, but Daley was going to survive. He was going to survive because he didn't believe in all that crap that the Marines lived by, especially putting yourself before everyone else. He wasn't that foolish.

"Fuck you Quinn!" He shouted angrily as he stepped backwards, away from. "Fuck all of you!"

All of a sudden, he heard the scrapping of the ceiling above him and looked up to see the grating disappear only to be replace by the biggest set of bloody fangs he had ever seen coming for him. The only thing he could think to do as they approached was let out an ear piercing scream as the large clawed hand picked him and killed him instantly when its secondary jaws sliced straight through his skull. Daley's blood splashed onto the floor below him like a bucket being spilled.

"Shoot!" Someone yelled and both Marin and Quinn let out a round of murderous bullets towards the ceiling at the creature.

The alien reacted once again with lightning fast reflexes, disappearing into the darkness from whence it came. All that remained was the bloody puddle that stood in Daley's place. The alien had seen fit to take his body for a use that none of the surviving Marines wanted to dwell very much on. Maia was horrified, just as the others were and no one spoke in the aftermath of Daley's death. Suddenly a thought struck with sudden clarity, she remembered what Ripley had said and it all started to make a terrifying sense.

They had to get away. There would be no fortifications strong enough to keep the aliens out! The Marines on LV427 had tried and failed because these things were relentless. They would search until they would find a way in, there was no real way to keep them out. None at all! If they were still here when the aliens came, they would become hosts for more of the damn things and if they stayed, the consequences were no better. The damn alien loose on their own ship would take them one at a time, until there was no one left!

"We're leaving the ship." Maia said suddenly, with an edge of desperation in her voice so slight that no one, except for maybe MacReady noticed it. "We're abandoning the ship, we'll take our chances in the APC and set this mother fucker for self destruct!" She declared, her throat almost dry from the fear she was starting to feel.

"Alright." Addison remarked, feeling jittery enough himself so that he could agree with the Captain's sudden change of plans. "Let's do it." The general feeling among the Marines was one of agreement, and they felt relieved that they would no longer be trapped here, as food for the alien's pleasure.

"Marin, Quinn, " Maia turned to the two Smart gunners, "go get all the ammunition the APC can carry and load it up. Get all the detonators available for the tactical nukes and meet me in here when you're done. Yates, Addison, Devine, get everything we need to survive. Anything, medicines, rations, everything that can possibly fit into the APC. With any luck we won't need them, but if Foster can't get the dropship here, then we'll have to supplied to wait for the rescue ship when it arrives."

"Where are we going?" Devine asked finally.

"As far away from this place as we can. We are going to put as much distance between us and the aliens as possible. I intend to follow through with my threat to Max earlier, so when those nukes go, we need to be at least thirty to forty miles if more away from here. I don' t care how far we go, just as long as we are well away from this damn place!"

Devine nodded quickly, somewhat startled by the urgency in Maia's voice and understanding what inspired it. It also frightened him somewhat that she, who had remained cool and collected throughout most of this nightmare was starting to feel fear. It gave the young Lieutenant cause to believe that he too, should feel afraid. "You heard the Captain," he said quietly. "Get to it." With that, the teams Maia had created, broke up to go and conduct their individual assignments.

When they had gone, Maia turned to MacReady whom she had ordered to remain behind. For what she was going to do next, she needed help and they didn't have much time to spare. "We don't have much time." She declared.

"What do you mean?" The Corporal asked, knowing that she was frightened by the tone of her voice.

"That thing is building a nest." She replied meeting his eyes, before looking around the expanse of the ship. "Somewhere in the ship."

"A nest?" He asked, not comprehending, mainly because he hadn't been present during Ripley's speech on the EEV recording.

"Yes," she nodded slowly, "when it took Daley I remembered something Ripley had said about the alien. She had explained it in the recording you see. I should have realised it before this and that was my mistake."

"I don't understand," he said impatiently, "what do you mean?"

"Everyone of those things has only one thought in its mind. One thing that dictates their entire existence and rules whatever it does. It needs, above all else, to ensure the survival of the species. Now that alien that landed with the EEV on Fiorina was able to lay eggs and give the company the specimens it needed for an entire hive. But it wasn't a queen."

At last it began to dawn on him and the possibility was not at all inviting. "Are you saying that everyone of those things can lay eggs that could become queens?"

She didn't need to answer. It was written all over her face.

"Jesus." He whispered softly.

Suddenly the gravity of the moment was shattered by the sound of scrapping metal. Maia heard it first, because she was accustomed to seek out the most minute noises in her trade. It came from above her head, and she looked up. "Listen!" She ordered.

MacReady was already looking upwards, but he was approaching the bench where his pulse rifle was currently resisting. However, before he could reach it, the grill above him came crashing down on the floor and quickly following it was a black, spindly tail that swished around violently before finding a target to attack. The tail struck him hard across the chest, sending across the room before he hit the steel floor hard. Maia saw him lay still, unconscious on the floor as the alien emerged from its hiding place.

It landed on the floor in front of her, raising to its full length as it straightened up. It had a monstrous head that seemed to be looking at her and Maia wondered if there were eyes somewhere on the creatures head. Then she realised that this thing didn't even have a soul. It was a mindless killer that survived only at the cost of theirs lives. The only thing that gave it life was its taste for blood.

The alien stared at her for a moment, perhaps unable to understand the stance of defiance taken up by this human. She was not retreating like the others had, in fact, the alien found that just as it was studying her, she was studying it. However the extent of its curiosity lasted for no more than a second as baser instincts prevailed and it bared its teeth that were gleaming with slime, before approaching her with its inner jaws brandished.

"Not so easy." Maia said shaking her head.

She removed her weapon as the creature lunged, and unloaded all the bullets in her gun without even taking the time to aim. Like the alien, she too acted on pure instinct and it was just as perfectly honed. The bullets in her gun emptied itself into the creature's head, exploding through the hard skin. It screeched loudly as the steel projectile tore through its hard exoskeleton and silicon flesh. Green acidic blood splashed over the room and Maia retreated, pulling the unconscious form of MacReady behind the APC to escape the acids' noxious fumes as it ate into the floor. The fumes alerted the internal sprinkler systems they went off, sounding out alert klaxons all over the ship.

Maia stayed down, holding MacReady's unconscious form in her arms, as they rode out the tempest. Foster was inside the APC and if he knew what was good for him, he would remain inside and continue with his work. Maia found herself breathing hard, not only because she was glad to be alive, but for an instant, her fear had almost taken over her. Maia had often believe fear was her ally, but today it had become a dreadful enemy that had almost gotten her killed.

She peered over the top of the APC and saw what remained of the alien. There wasn't much of it left, most of the body had disappeared down the hole created by its acidic blood and even that was quickly being washed away by the water of the sprinklers. Maia turned back to MacReady who lay on the floor, his forehead was gushing with blood. However, the wound looked worse than it was. Examining it closely, Maia decided that at the most, it would need a few stitches.

"Mac." She called out, shaking him gently.

He stirred slightly.

"Come one soldier," she nudged him so more. "It isn't that bad. Get on your feet."

MacReady stirred and opened his eyes. He became aware of the warmth running down his cheek in red waves of pain. Groaning slightly, he reached for the wound and winced when he touched it. "Ouch," he muttered. "That's hurts, what happened?"

"The alien gave you quite a throw." Maia replied, pleased that he was awake. "You've got a bit of a cut, but other than that, we're both fine."

MacReady sat up uneasily, still feeling his head swim while the wound on his forehead throbbed painfully. "What happened to our guest?" He inquired, as he tried to stand up. However, when he finally got to his feet, the hole in the middle of the floor was answer enough. "Shit." He mumbled.

"No kidding." She replied, standing up. The klaxons and sprinklers were still functioning and she made her way to the near by wall in order to deactivate them. She had just reached the controls when the doors slid open and the Marines hurried in with Devine in front of them.

"What happened Sir? Are you alright?" He asked quickly.

"Yes, yes," she nodded wearily as she switched off the klaxons and the sprinklers. She was glad to have silence once their noise had abated and the water had stopped flowing. "The alien tried to make a grab at me and MacReady." She gestured towards the charred hole where the alien had been.

"Wasted." Marin remarked as she took a closer look at it.

"Yates," Devine called out noticing that MacReady was bleeding. "See to the Corporal will you?"

However Yates was already on her way to MacReady and winced slightly at the fact that Devine didn't think she knew her job. Within seconds of reaching him, the medic was busy at work cleaning MacReady's wound and applying an antiseptic salve to it.

"At least that's one less alien to worry about." Devine replied, but he spoke to soon. No sooner than he had uttered those words, the klaxons began screaming all over the ship again and the ship was bathed in the angry reddish glow of blood which indicated battle alert.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I

Maia hurried to the viewing console on the upper deck, amidst the screaming sound of the ship's klaxon ringing through her ears. The Marines behind her, followed closely as she ran up the steel floor of the dropship. A few seconds later, she arrived at the monitor screen and attacked the keyboard before it with fervent vigour. Pounding the instructions she needed into the terminal, the screen before her flickered with static before showing her what it was that had raised the emergency alarms.

"They're attacking." She declared to Devine and the others when they caught up with her. On the screen, the aliens were attacking in full force, their numbers seemed to overwhelmed the screen, as they quickly invaded the dropship's defence perimeter. The remote sentries that she had ordered to be placed at the boundary of that perimeter was working at full capacity as it sent a murderous hail of bullets in all directions in an attempt to keep the alien infestation at bay.

"Jesus." Addison exclaimed with morbid fascination. "Look at em come." However, it was obvious that his sentiments were focused on the fact that the sentries would only be able to keep them at bay as long as their artillery supply wasn't in danger of being exhausted. Judging by the sheer number of aliens that were attempting to get past it, that danger was going to quickly become a reality.

" 'A` gun is critical." Maia stated, as she glanced at the counter reading on the screen. The remote sentry's bullets were being discharged at a devastating pace and the number of rounds left was quickly being diminished.

"Everybody," Devine said with a grim tone to his voice but quickly developing a wisdom of experience that enabled him to act. "Weapons ready." Without a word, the Marines complied. Each of them checking their pulse rifles to ensure that they had full magazines and that everything was working.

"'A' gun is gone." Maia said softly. On the screen, the remote sentry stopped dead in its tracks, the barrel of its gun slumped forward impotent, offering the aliens no more danger. As soon as it had been exhausted, a large swarm of black moved past the screen as the aliens quickly advanced into their defence perimeter. They would be at the hull of the ship in a matter of minutes.

"Fuck!" Addison exclaimed again, "they're on us!"

If things could not get any worse, Maia saw the counter reading on 'B' gun and it was not good. However, they were still alive and Maia intended to see that things remained that way. "Addison and Marin," she spoke up looking at the two of them. "Get to the starboard section."

"Yes Sir." Marin nodded, before the two Marines hurried away. She hoped silently that she would see them again.

"'B' gun's gone now." Devine stated and turned Maia's attention back to the screen. She saw a scene similar to that of when 'A' gun had gone. The aliens were falling down on the remote sentry like a tide of bodies. Very soon no one could see where the gun had been as the thick, wave of alien drones had drowned out any presence of it.

For a moment, there was silence, as everyone held their breath to see what would happen now. The hull of the dropship was made to withstand the heat of re-entry, it had even survived an attack by a missile, yet no one in the room doubted that the aliens would remain outside for very long. Suddenly, as if on cue to those very thoughts in their minds, the walls of the dropship began pounding loudly. Loud, clanging sounds echoed through the length and the breath of the ship.

"Marin, what's happening?" MacReady demanded in his com unit.

After a momentary pause, an answer came back. "They're trying to get through the hatch man! They're denting the outer hull, they're denting it!"

"Christ!" MacReady exclaimed and looked to Maia for guidance and direction.

Maia thought quickly, the pounding become more intense as they began to hear the sound of metal groaning in resistance. This time the pounding did not come from just one side of the ship, but from all around it. "Marin, Addison, get back here! Abandon your post! We're moving out!"

"Thank Christ." She heard Addison's frightened voice in the background. Suddenly she heard another voice on the com unit. It was Foster.

"Captain," he said coolly, as if none of what was happening was even affecting him. "The hull has been breached."

Without missing a beat, even though the news rocked all of them, Maia answered coolly. "How long until the dropship arrives?"

ETA, sixty minutes." He answered.

It was better than nothing, she supposed. "Alright," Maia nodded, knowing what she had to do and wishing she would be able to survive to meet that dropship. Turning to Yates, she looked at the young woman and said firmly, "give me your pulse rifle."

The medic did so without question, even though she seemed slightly confused as to why. She handed Maia her weapon and all the ammunition she had to go with it. "What do you intend to do Sir?"

Maia didn't answer her at first. The Captain slung her weapon around her shoulder and tucked the magazines into their flight suit for convenient retrieval if she needed it. When that was done, she turned to Devine. "I want you to take the squad and proceed to the APC. Give me ten minutes, after you have arrived. If I am not there by then, you are to leave the dropship and proceed to the rendezvous with the other dropship. If necessary, instruct Foster to keep driving until you've left the aliens well and truly behind, we cannot afford to let even one of them get on board the dropship with us. Is that understood?"

"Yes Sir." Devine nodded, although he didn't seemed to like the idea of having to leave her behind if she did not appear. Maia didn't like it either and she was determined that she would force him to face such a choice.

"What about you?" MacReady looked at her with concern.

"I'm going to set the ship for self destruct, the pressure of the explosion should also detonate the nukes we have on board. When we leave this planet, the explosion is going to wipe out almost thirty kilometres of acreage, that will be enough to clean out the aliens and their fucking nest."

"We can't leave you." He said almost defiantly, with a pained expression on his face. Maia took a deep breath, seeing for the first time, the true extent of his feelings towards her and finding, to her own surprise, that much of what he felt was mirrored in her own feelings towards him. In doing so, it suddenly occurred to her that the relationship between them could indeed become something that was really good, provided that both of them were still alive after this. Which wouldn't happen unless she was allowed to do what was needed to ensure everyone's survival.

"I'll be fine Mac," she said with a smile meant only for him. "Now, get going, all of you!"

"Come on Mac," Yates said gently, giving his arm a slight tug as the she led him towards the other Marines who were beginning to move out with Devine in the lead. MacReady turned away and took a few steps forward before he paused and turned back to her. "I'll be waiting Maia."

************

When they were all gone, Maia took another deep breath and turned to the screen. The room was still echoing with the sounds of clanging, as the aliens pursued their relentless bid to infiltrate this last sanctuary of theirs. Her fingers flew over the keyboard in front of her as she activated the dropship's self destruct mechanism. Within seconds of those instructions, angry red letters appeared before her.

DESTRUCT SEQUENCE INITIALIZED.

PLEASE ENTER AUTHORISATION CODE TO COMPLETE SEQUENCE.

Maia acted quickly. Her authorisation code was the only one that would activate this sequence. Even Devine would have difficulty acting this programme because it was on record in the ship's computer that she was the commanding officer. Only in the event of her death, which had to be verified by the termination of her life signs in the APC life stats screen, would Devine be able to carry out this function. Quickly, she entered her code into the computer.

AUTHORISATION CODE: SANJAY. T. MAIA/ALPHA - 3230-2678.

AUTHORISATION CODE RECOGNISED.

KEY IN TIMER SEQUENCE.

Maia gave herself and the Marines a timer start of sixty minutes, ensuring that when the explosion erupted, they would have just boarded the dropship and made good their escape, without any trouble. If by any chance, that they would have to stay here, then the sixty minutes would be ample time for them to get away from the blast radius with time to spare. Once Maia had keyed in the timer sequence, she pressed the enter button and activated the count-down to the destruct mechanism.

With that done, she picked her weapon and hurried out of the room, to keep her rendezvous with the Marines and the APC.

II

Meanwhile, Devine and MacReady were leading the remaining Marines towards the APC. Strangely enough, they had yet to encounter any aliens, even though the evidence of their penetration into the dropship could be heard each time they heard another bulkhead give in. MacReady guessed they must have been looking for them in the upper decks and he hoped the Captain was well and truly out of there by now. Even though she was his commanding officer, he felt it difficult to separate rank and his feelings for her. She was unarguably the strongest woman he had ever met and yet she was also the most feminine woman he ever knew at the same time. He wasn't ready for either of them to die, at least not yet.

Suddenly, he saw a flutter of movement from the ceiling above them. Without thought, he swung around to see it descend from its hiding place in the darkness to pounce on their medic. Yates let out a scream as the full weight of the creature bore down on her. The only weapon she had on her was her service revolver and that fell out of her reach when the alien had knocked her to the ground.

"Cat!" Marin cried out and was about to fire when Addison reacted first, pushing the barrel of her pulse rifle aside. "What are you doing?" She shouted angrily.

"You'll hit her too!" Addison snapped. "Don't you remember? They bleed acid!"

The beast did not kill Yates who was still struggling, however, it did possess enough foresight to know that its preys companions would not retaliate if their comrade was still alive. From out of nowhere, MacReady saw a slivery projection eject from the alien and struck Yates on the side of her cheek. The young woman went limp almost instantly, before the alien leapt into the air, carrying her with it as it disappeared into the conduits and into the shadows once again.

"Yates!" Marin shouted as she saw her friend disappear. The flurry of movement that MacReady had seen was still visible, even as it was drawing further away from them. Without any thought, Marin ran forward after the creature before Quinn could grab her to stop her.

"Tina, come back here!" He shouted as he ran after her.

"Come on!" MacReady remarked giving the smart gunners pursuit, urging the others to move.

"Wait a minute!" Devine called out after them both. Halting the procession, before it even began. "We're under orders!"

"Lieutenant." MacReady said icily, unable to believe that they were even discussing this. "I don't think the Captain meant for us to let one of own get killed when it was in our power to stop it. The alien isn't even out of the ship yet, if we can grab it before it leaves the ship, there's a good chance we can save Yates." With that, the Corporal hurried off, with Addison following, leaving Devine where he stood.

Devine remained where he stood for a few seconds, unable to decide what to do. His entire life was dictated by orders, orders were supreme entities and he had always followed them to the letter. Disobeying them frightened him, especially when it came from a Captain, and also because it would mean risking his life for a bunch of grunts whom he didn't know at all. Why should he have to die here, if they chose to? Devine decided that he would go with his instincts.

And those instincts told him to go to the APC, even if it was alone.

He hurried down the corridor, feeling slightly remorseful that he hadn't followed his troops into battle. However, they had been the ones who disobeyed orders, while he was determined to carry them out. The young lieutenant ran down the dark passageway, feeling the claustrophobic confines now more than ever. Still, he was going to survive this insane mission, he would survive and he would return to Earth. Perhaps when he made it back, he would have to rethink his entire army career. Surely there was better things for a West Point Lieutenant to do then have to baby-sit a bunch of grunts? After all, he had been coerced by his father in accepting this position, but he was a man now. A man with a choice and with some determination in where his destiny took him.

Let the others die on some backwater world that sat in the middle of the wilderness of space, if they wanted to. Just because of some outdated code of honour. Not him, not Lieutenant Lance Devine, he was never cut out to be honourable or noble. He was a survivor, and survivors got that way because they knew when to draw the line, knew when to bail out when the time was right, with no thought to anyone else. If he had learnt anything during this fools errand, he had learnt this much.

All of a sudden, like a streak of lightning, he saw an enormous black shape coming towards him as it approached in a series of long, powerful leaps. The alien's claws were bared, its widening mouth coming for him with untold savagery. Devine reacted quickly, firing his service revolver at the beast. The projectiles tore through the creature and stopped it in mid flight. It fell to the ground like a plane that had been shot down, its blood splashing in all directions as it erupted from its skin. Devine stepped back to avoid being hit with the corrosive liquid.

He heard another sound behind him and he swung around quickly, seeing another alien making its approach just as quickly as the one he had just felled. Firing quickly, he emptied the entire contents of his revolver into the creatures head and watched in horror as it died where he had cut it down. However, with its passing, Devine could see others approaching just as rapidly, for they were determined to have him one way or another. He reached into his pocket and pulled out another magazine as he began running away, terrified by the sheer number of the aliens that were coming for him.

Devine raced down the corridor and came to a staircase which would take him to the APC hangar. He kept looking over his shoulder, trying to make certain that there were no aliens behind him. Hurrying down the steel steps, his heavy boots slammed against the grilled, metal floor. He was breathing hard, beyond terror now and regretting the decision to leave the others. All of a sudden, he saw an alien come up in front of him from below. He raised his gun to fire, shredding the creature easily enough. In his panic, he kept firing even after the creature was dead, even with its acidic blood eating into the metal. When he stopped firing, he discovered he had emptied an entire magazine into the alien and reached for another one. To his horror, he found that he had used his last clip. For a moment, he knew not what to do, however, after a moment of thought, he hurried forward, determined he could reach the APC before the aliens caught up with him.

When he reached the end of the staircase, it was like he had reached the entrance to salvation. He moved through the doorway, seeing the APC in the near distance, unharmed and waiting for his arrival. Devine took a deep breath to steady himself as he walked towards it, allowing himself to rest easy as he made his way towards the APC's main hatch. He was about to push the button on the door when suddenly he heard a loud hiss. For a moment, he thought Foster had detected his arrival and had taken the liberty of opening the hatch from the inside. However, when the hatch remained as it was, Devine knew he had been wrong.

The inners jaws of the alien hidden in the shadows behind Lieutenant Devine snapped forward, as if released by a hinge. They smashed through his forehead and splattered his brains all over the walls of the APC and the floor of the dropship, before he even had time to scream. His body jerked spasmodically as it reconciled itself with death before the alien flung it away impatiently and went on its way.

**************

The android Foster was busy at work.

Even though his behavioural programming was nagging at him to assist the humans attempting to reach the APC, he knew his best chance of helping them was to remain at his post, bringing the other dropship from the Sparta by remote. The aliens had left the APC and him alone, mainly because they say the vehicle as nothing they could use and since he assumed they had ways of detecting life that weren't conventional, they would have detected him as something that was not quite alive and therefore beneath their notice.

Occasionally he heard the sound of gun fire and forced himself to ignore, because he had more important work to deal with it at the moment. The ship was alive with the unnatural sound of the alien infiltration, and only moments ago, he heard something odd outside the APC. However, Foster would not run the risk of allowing an alien in here because the others, when they did arrive, would need this vehicle intact to escape. Despite the outside interferences, Foster worked diligently to bring down the dropship. The ship had successfully entered the atmosphere as he had launched according to the Captain's instructions.

The Weyland Yutani space station had been unable to detect the ship because he had let it free fall, almost until the point it was near the atmosphere and out of the range of any missile. Foster hoped that there were still survivors to meet that ship when it arrived. He didn't relish the idea of ending up like the android Bishop, being the only survivor and witness to the Company's treachery.

He didn't want to return home to Earth on the Sparta alone.

Elsewhere, Maia was fastidiously making her way down the same staircase that only minutes ago, had been traversed by the late Lieutenant Devine. She had been incredibly lucky in her journey to this point, for even though she had encounter a few aliens, she had survived those meetings, thanks to the Pulse Rifle that she held close to her. Emerging through the entrance way leading to the APC hold, Maia felt similar feelings of elation, even when she came across the dead alien in the way. She assumed this was the work of the others and felt another sigh of relief knowing that they had reached the APC safely.

However, as she approached the APC, she notice blood stains on the hull of the vehicle and on the floor. There was a pulpish mess she didn't want to identify and wasn't going to until she felt her foot hit something soft on the floor. Maia knelt down and found the remains of Devine's body. Where had been his face was a mess of blood and flesh that made his features unrecognisable. Only his uniform led to realise that it was indeed him.

"You poor stupid kid." Maia whispered as she felt a pang of remorse for this young man who was given too much responsibility too soon and had paid with his life. She paused at a hissing sound that was almost silent to anyone else, except her trained ear. Cocking her gun, she spun around on her knees and fired into the alien that had tried to attack her from the rear. It screeched loudly as it lunged for her, but the bullets fired, threw it back against the wall, tearing it apart. Maia jumped out of the way of the spraying acid, as droplets of it sprinkled onto the floor and Devine's body before it began eating through.

Opening the door to the APC, Maia was never more pleased to see the battered, armoured vehicle which had saved all their lives more than once during this nightmarish mission. Once inside, she slammed the button closing the door, and turned around, expecting to see the Marines and finding none of them before her.

"I'm glad you made it Sir." He said, but Maia did not share his sentiments. She wanted to know where the others were.

"Where are the others?" Maia demanded, staring at him with anxiousness.

"They never arrived." He answered, confused at her fear. "You are the first one I've seen so far."

"Jesus." Maia groaned as her eyes raised to the life stat screen on the nearby wall. Her eyes widened as she saw the life sign readings of Marin, Addison, Quinn, Yates and MacReady. With a soft thud, she fell back on one of the seats as she saw their status. All the readings were the same, except for one jagged edge which arrived at two second intervals, there was no other reaction. Only Devine’s was a complete flat line, but Maia had expected that. The readings indicated the worse, they had been captured, they were exceedingly weak, but they were alive and captured.

The readings were identical to O'Neill's.

Even their cameras showed images frozen in place, almost as if they were held there electronically. The surroundings were dark, but Maia knew with certainty what she was looking at. In the corner of the screens, she could see aliens moving about and Maia recognised the place immediately. Realising it, did not help her very much or the Marines that were missing.

For a few minutes, she couldn't tell how long, Maia Sanjay sat there in her chair thinking. She considered leaving, taking the APC to the rendezvous point and getting off this planet on the dropship. There was much to do on Earth, settling up with Max and the Company came to mind. That would however, mean leaving MacReady behind with all those others, to a death that was too cruel to imagine. The truth was, these people had come to mean a lot to her, not just MacReady but all of them. The past few hours had seen them weather the worse together, they had stood by her, confident in her abilities and her strength.

They had believed in her.

And that belief meant too much to Maia, for her to simply up and leave them in this hellish place. So much so that she was going to get them back, no matter what the consequences to herself. With a sigh, she turned slowly to Foster and took a deep breath, too reaffirm her own resolve.

"Foster, we're going to the hive."

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I

There wasn't much time.

To be exact, all she had was forty minutes. Forty minutes to get to the alien hive, to find her friends if they were still alive and not yet impregnated by the alien seed, and then to bring them out of there while staying alive herself. Maia held all these things into account, thinking of how trivial and simple it sounded when she played them out in her head like this. It sounded like just another mission. Only when Maia drove the APC towards the hive, did she know better.

It was well into the night on Fiorina 361, the air was chilly yet Maia could feel sweat trickling down her back, staining the T- shirt she wore underneath her two piece flight suit. She knew she was afraid, for she could feel the fear gnawing at her insides like a merciless intruder. Trying to force away that terror was no longer a simple thing, for the images of the alien's savagery was hard to dispel. After all the people that had been killed, what made her think that she would fare any better? Let alone be in any position to rescue her friends.

Ahead of her, the alien hive loomed ominously in the distance like a haunted house children often viewed from a far, because they were too frightened to approach it. Maia felt that way herself. She didn't want to go into that place, but she had no choice. Outside the structure, she saw no signs of life, no indication that an alien species had made it their home. Perhaps if she were lucky, the bulk of the alien numbers would be out of the hive in force, trying to locate more humans to play hosts to their young. If that was so, then she had a slight advantage, if not much. Even one alien was more than enough.

Maia glanced at the proximity gauge strapped to her arm. The Marines life signs were transmitted on a specific frequency which allowed the APC to always know the status of their health. The proximity gauge would pick up that frequency and indicate to its user from where the signal was being transmitted. At the moment, the distance on the gauge was rapidly decreasing as they neared the alien dome. At least, she knew for certain where they were and this device would lead her straight to them.

"The drop ship has penetrated the surface." Foster stated, breaking the silence. "It should be here in less than thirty minutes."

"Good." Maia nodded. "I'd better hurry."

Foster said nothing to her statement, although he had to admit, he disliked her going into the alien nest alone. He felt he should have at least accompany her, but the Captain had been adamant; they needed the dropship more than she needed him.

The APC made a slight turn as it began to circumnavigate the base of the dome, in search of the large fissure she had made when she had rescued the Marines from this place during their first encounter with the alien. Within seconds, Maia found the gap and directed the APC to drive straight through it. Moving slowly, she made certain that none of the aliens had attached itself to the craft, after all, as strong as the APC's outer shell was, the aliens had proven their strength when they broke through the hull of the dropship. And Maia wanted to stay alive too much to underestimate them again.

To survive the hunt, she had to stop being a prey and start becoming a hunter.

The APC advanced forward shakily, the uneven ground jostling everyone and everything in the vehicle. Maia checked the gauge again and saw that the distance between her and the Marines was diminishing, so much so that she was now in walking distance of them. Looking through the windscreen, she could see nothing but the strange constructions of the alien hive and realised that she had penetrated the secondary chamber. Finally, the APC ground to a halt, going as far as it could on this uneven terrain. Begrudgingly, Maia decided the rest of the journey would have to be made on foot and she hoped the Marines weren't too far away.

In two quick strides, she made it to the cache of weapons stored in the APC, by the Marines earlier on. She quickly selected what she needed, taking an entire belt of Pulse rifle ammunition and wrapping it around her waist. Sighting a flame thrower as well, she put the pulse rifle and the flame unit up against each other, before joining them together with strong electrical tape. Maia also helped herself to a body belt full of hand grenades. She decided that if she were going to stick her head into the lion's mouth, then it would be prudent to not toy with half measures. Finally, she decided she was ready and rose to her feet with her arsenal close at hand.

"Foster," she spoke to the android. "You are to keep this door sealed once I'm gone. Do not open it for any reason, we can't afford to let one of those things in here."

"Yes Sir." He nodded in understanding. He watched the Captain proceed to the hatch and open it, before he spoke again. "Good luck Captain."

Maia met his eyes in acknowledgement and answered with a slight nod before the hatch opened before her. She wondered if he knew how afraid she was but said nothing to that effect. Without wasting any more time, she turned away and stepped out into the maw.

***********

Even though she had been here before, it was the first time Maia had been inside the hive without the benefit of the APC to protect her. The hive was dark and only the headlights of the APC illuminated the way ahead. She was grateful that she had attached a small torch onto her gun, otherwise when she delved deeper into the hive, she would have no way to see anything. Moving slowly, she felt her stomach turn at the stickiness of the ground, for slime on it seemed to grab at her soles of her shoes. Somewhere, she could hear tiny droplets of water falling on the ground with a sharp plink.

Maia hoped those droplets of fluid were water and not anything else. The most overpowering sensation of all, of course was the stench of the decaying flesh of past hosts. Sucking in her breath, she moved stealthy, trying not to force her fear to get the better of her. Maia began memorising the line she always used when she was afraid. A little healthy fear was a good thing, it might just help you stay alive. She kept saying those words repeatedly as she utilised a lifetime of skill, specifically for the art of covert movement. She had no idea how the aliens detected humans, or other life forms, so a silent strike was all she had. Glancing at the gauge, she saw that she was headed in the right direction, for they were only meters ahead.

Straining to see, she directed her flash light at the darkness and found herself staring at Private Tina Marin's unconscious face. Maia hurried forward as she saw the young woman hanging against the side of the wall, pin there by some kind of industrial strength resin. Marin made no move at Maia's arrival, since she was still very much unconscious. In front of Marin was an unsealed egg.

Maia sighed in relief, the spore had yet to emerge. It would probably do so when Marin regained consciousness and displayed visible life signs. Maia went to Marin and tried to shake the woman into consciousness, to no avail. Whatever the aliens had sedated her with was strong and Maia had to guess that they were all that way. Suddenly, Maia heard the egg behind her hiss open and she swung around instantly. It opened up like some awful parody of a flower, its terrible spawn throbbing within, await to emerge.

No such restraint held her back, she pulled her finger on the trigger of the flame thrower and let loose a jet of flames which engulfed the egg and the spore inside in less than a second after contact. The entire cavern lit up as the egg burned and allowed Maia to see that MacReady, Addison and Quinn. Maia didn't see Yates, but she assumed the young medic wasn't far away.

However, first things first. She let loose another jet of flames from the flame thrower which effectively incinerated the other eggs that were waiting to impregnate the other Marines. Once they were done with, she hurried to free Marin, knowing full and well that her little bonfire would probably have alerted the adult aliens to her presence. She began tearing away at the resinous bonds holding the young woman captive, with a small survival knife she had packed with her. Within seconds, she slumped forward towards Maia, who caught her easily and pulled her out of the corridor.

Fortunately, the illumination from the flames revealed to Maia that the APC was not that far away, and if she moved quickly, she could get all of them out of this place within the next ten minutes. It was difficult to move, but Maia did so anyway, dragging the unconscious woman along while still holding her gun close to her. Which was just as well, for out of nowhere, an alien lunged out of nowhere at her. Maia reacted speedily, sending another jet of flames forward that consumed the alien whole before it could even reach her. She watched it momentarily, as it screeched in defiance when it collapsed on the floor. Once it was no longer a threat, she continued on her way.

Upon arriving at the APC, she slammed one hand against the hatch and watched the door slid open. She didn't announce herself to Foster, because she knew he was concentrating on landing the dropship and she had no time for conversation herself. Dropping the unconscious Marin in the doorway, she retreated backward and shut the door behind her before going back for the others.

MacReady was the next one she came across, and he was like Marin, unconscious from the alien sedative. And like Marin, he too had been trapped in that resinous substance. It was unnerving to Maia how peaceful he was as he slept on, much of his masculine bravado had gone and his features took on an almost cherubic glow. A part of smiled, thinking what his reaction would be if she told him that. However, another part of her was unsettled by how utterly at ease he was in the midst of this madness around him. Still this was hardly the time to ponder the question and she had little of it as it was. Working quickly, she soon had him free of his bonds and Maia started dragging him back to the APC.

II

Within ten minutes, Maia's efforts were rewarded. She had moved MacReady, Addison and Quinn into the APC in good time, despite the fact that all were unconscious and she had to use all her strength to move them over that distance. Quinn in particular had been difficult to move, because of his large size. Fortunately, her few intrusions with the aliens that dwelt in this place had ended with a short bursts from the flame thrower.

Now all that remained for her to do was locate Yates. Secretly it disturbed Maia, why she hadn't seen Yates with the others and she knew for a fact that the young woman was still alive because she had seen the medic's life signs on the life stats screens. Yates' signs had been weak, but they indicated she was still alive. Maia ran further up the corridor, taking a chance that the young woman was simply further along the wall. She glanced at her watch and saw that she had twenty minutes left to find Yates. Maia reached the far end of the wall and saw another fissure leading into a third chamber she hadn't seen before.

"Captain." Maia froze at the sound of a voice.

Maia paused where she stood, looking around for the source of the spoken sound. Suddenly she saw a flutter of movement and discovered it to be Yates. Unlike the others, the medic was fully conscious and this made Maia feel uneasy. Taking a few tentative steps forward, she suddenly froze.

The egg in front of Yates was unsealed.

The spore that it had birthed was lying dead at Yates' feet.

Slowly, Maia lifted her gaze and rested on Yates' eyes. Sympathy filled her soul for this young woman who was now beyond help, who was beyond anything. "I'm sorry," was all that Maia could say and it sounded weak.

"They got me first." Yates croaked, tears welling up in her eyes. "I guess the others tried to get me back." Her faced was white from the sheer terror of what was to come. "I don't want to see it come out of me," she looked at Maia, with pleading eyes. "I don't want to feel the pain."

"What do you want me to do?" Maia asked softly, although she knew Yates' answer already.

"Kill me," she begged, tears running down her cheeks as her voice broke. "Kill me please. I can feel it moving inside of me, I don't want to die that way. I want it to be quick."

Maia blinked, trying to swallow away that lump in her throat and finding that she couldn't. She took a step forward and cradled the young woman's head on her shoulder. "I promise you it will be."

"Thank you Captain." Yates said gratefully, sobbing slightly. The barrel of Maia's gun snaked up the side of her head without her even knowing. Maia herself found it difficult to compose herself because this young, sweet girl didn't deserved to die this way, nobody did. Maia inched back as she pulled the trigger once. All it took to end her misery was one lone bullet and Maia couldn't deny her that. The stillness of the air was shattered by the crack of a gun shot and Yates' body jerked about violently in reflex, before she died.

Maia blinked hard, trying to wash away this awful feeling in her gut. Stepping further back, she pulled the trigger of the flame thrower and engulfed the medic's body in flames. As the dead body became consumed by fire, the passage way was illuminated with a bright orange glow. Maia swallowed again, thinking that if Yates had to die because of these damn aliens, then the alien seed she carried would die too.

As Maia moved back from the flames, she felt her heel strike something soft. Slowly, she looked over her shoulder, and found her heart leapt out of her chest from horror.

The chamber she was in, contained nothing but alien eggs.

************

It explained a lot.

It explained why the number of aliens she encountered had been minimal, unlike the horde that had swarmed over the dropship earlier. It was a characteristic dominant of most high entomological societies. The area surrounding the egg layer was usually devoid of drones, because that was the way the queen usually liked it. As Maia stared at the sheer number of eggs in the chamber, beads of sweat ran down her forehead. Somewhere in the darkness, she heard a loud hiss.

It sat there, perched on top of the massive biological conveyor belt which had been birthing all these eggs, through a tubular membrane which throbbed with opaque and gelatinous fluids. Maia could only stare at it, because she didn't doubt that she wasn't staring at anything less than the alien queen. The supreme entity within this hive. She was nearly triple the size of the other aliens, with flashing teeth that were almost the size of Maia's forearm. From them, dribbled saliva as the queen regarded Maia with interest. with a massive head supported crown like appendages which seemed rather appropriate, Maia thought.

It seemed so ironic.

Maia against the Queen. Like Ripley, thirty years before.

Both protecting their own, both willing to fight for the death to see that their children were safe. As Maia stared at the alien queen, it seemed to her that even her alien counterpart knew they were looking at each other as equals. A fight to the death, Maia decided. Her human life lost would mean that this alien queen would be allowed to continue producing more progeny, and that progeny would see the end of the human race if the Company were to bring them back to Earth.

"You've hurt people." Maia spoke, not understanding why she was even talking to this alien, when it was doubtful she could even be understood. Somehow, instincts told Maia otherwise. "You've hurt people and I am going to stop you once and for all. Before there is another Nostromo, Acheron, Colonial Marines, Fiorina's prisoners, another Yates or a Ripley. Its time to pay, and I'm here to collect bitch!"

Without another word, Maia raised her pulse rifle and aimed at the queen. The alien matriarch roared in outrage and fury, but Maia was beyond caring. Those deaths had preyed heavily on her mind and she had to do this for all of them. Maia pumped three rounds into the alien queen from the grenade launcher installed in the pulse rifle. Not waiting to hear the ensuing explosions, she turned on her heels and ran out. Two aliens emerged from nowhere, likely suspecting the danger their precious queen was in, and attacked. Maia reacted swiftly, dispatching them with an onslaught of bullets.

She paused at the entrance to the second chamber, long enough to see loud explosion which annihilated the alien queen, her biological conveyor belt and her precious eggs. All were torn asunder by the explosion which rocked the structure precariously. As hot jets of flames lashed out, Maia turned and ran out of their reach. Jumping over the flaming eggs she had ignited earlier, Maia reached the APC after long last. They had to get out of here fast, because Maia suspected the aliens would be coming back here in full force, when they discovered she had blown their queen to pieces.

"We're getting out of here!" She announced out of breath once she had entered the APC, and secured the door behind her. The heat of the flames had singed her skin and she felt pain, however this was not the time to let it overwhelm her, they had yet to get out of here alive. Hurrying to the controls of the APC, she slid into the chair breathing hard.

"I'm pleased to see you in one piece." Foster remarked. "The dropship is almost here."

"Good." Maia smiled as she activated the vehicles' engines.

The Marines were still unconscious she noticed, and remained that way even when she jammed her foot on the accelerator and the APC rumbled forward. The vehicle sped out of the dome, unfretted by anything in its way. Within seconds, they were out of the hive and Maia could see the dropship appearing in through the thick, grey clouds of Fiorina's sky. She didn't think that she would ever see anything as beautiful as its descent through the clouds, ever again.

The aliens, Maia noticed were moving back towards the hive in great numbers, ignoring the presence of the APC as it moved forward. Maia guessed they were more concerned with the fate of their queen and salvaging what remained of their hive, before they remembered the humans they had been trying to acquire as hosts. This suited her just fine, because by the time they did remember, it would be too late any way. The surprise she had left them in the damaged dropship would take care of them once and for all.

The dropship made its descent smoothly, with Foster still directing its flight path with expert navigations. Maia reminded herself to give the android a pat on the back when this was all over. His conduct during this entire nightmare had been exemplary. As the dropship touched down on the ground, some distance away from the hive and the Fiorina prison, Maia who was at the controls activated the automatic doors and the large hatchway built to accommodate the APC, slid open.

She sped through the opening, closing it as quickly as possible to prevent any unwanted guests from boarding the vessels, namely aliens. Once they were safely tucked inside the APC hold, there was a loud clang as the hatch doors finally closed behind them. Maia glanced at her watch and then quickly jumped out of her seat, side stepping the unconscious bodies of her fellow Marines before arriving at the APC's exit. They had to get off the planet quickly because in five minutes, this entire place would be encased in a nuclear fireball.

Both android and human raced out of the APC and hurried to the cockpit. While Maia took the pilot's seat, Foster took the co-pilots chair. For an instance, Maia felt saddened that she was taking Alicia Hall's place but forced the thought quickly out of her mind. There would be ample time to grieve later. Activating the launch sequence, the vessel roared to life with the healthy drone of engines igniting. Placing her hands on the controls, she raised the control stick gently. The craft responded by making a sharp heave upwards and they could see the ground drawing away from them.

"We've got launch." Foster announced happily.

"We're not out of it yet." Maia retorted quickly, never keeping out of her mind that there was a thermo-nuclear device below that was about to go off. Until they were far above the clouds of Fiorina, she would not be able to relax. This was the kind of caution that made Maia Sanjay the best. Pulling harder at the controls, the dropship began to accelerate faster, moving through the clouds like a bolt of lightning.

Only when they had topped the clouds, when all they could see around them was the high altitude sky of Fiorina which had taken an almost ash grey colour, did the self destruct mechanism on the dropship still remaining on Fiorina, reach critical mass. Both of them closed their eyes as the brilliant flash of light illuminated the sky around them. A second later, the explosion took with it, the rest of the nuclear warheads on board the dropship, resulting in a gigantic explosion that formed in a mushroom cloud. The shock wave threw the remaining air borne dropship forward, but the vessel itself was able to withstand this with no damage incurred.

And below on the surface of Fiorina, in the heart of the devastation, the voices of countless dead were at last laid to rest.

The voices belonging to Captain Dallas and the crew of the Nostromo, the people of Acheron, the Marines of the Sulloco and also the dead of the Sparta, even the prisoners of Fiorina and most of all, Officer Ellen Ripley, were at last silent and at peace.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

I

Even though they had broken orbit and made good their escape from Fiorina within the confines of the dropship, with the events that had taken place in the last forty eight hours still fresh in their minds, by Maia's reckonings, things were far from being over. As she sat at the controls of the dropship, Maia knew that she had much to resolve and retribution to deliver to those who had caused this entire nightmare. Thinking back at everything that had transpired, it almost felt like a dream, like nothing that they had been through could possibly be real; and yet Maia knew better.

It was real.

And if there was a special hell for those who were the embodiments of the ugliest of human vices, greed, then it would be totally accommodated by the men who sat in command of the Weyland Yutani Corporation. For them, and for of course, Max. She had made a pledge to herself that she would personally deliver him, because his betrayal had been the worst, to that hell herself. Because of him and the Company, nine people had died and Maia intended to avenge those deaths.

Hall.

O'Neill.

Daley.

Hawkins.

Parker.

Clark.

Jankowski.

Doran

And Yates. The most painful death of all. What she had endured demanded justice, because Maia knew that until the end of her days, there would always be apart of her that had been cut out when she was forced to stare into the hollow eyes of that poor child, just before Maia took her life. Took it, before the alien horror that had invaded her body, violated it in the worst way imaginable.

The dropship flew towards the Weyland Yutani space station at maximum velocity. Far more quickly than any missile ever could. She didn't doubt they wouldn't attempt to fire at the dropship any way, but this time, she was ready. Caught unawares, the dropship was momentarily vulnerable which was what had allowed the Company to shoot them down in the first place. However, when it was prepared, the dropship was a formidable weapon and was capable of eluding the simplistic missile system of an non military organisation. The dropship was an assault craft and when properly utilised, an adversary of frightening potential.

"You're right Sir." Foster remarked as he studied the scopes on his corner of the controls. "They have torpedo launch."

"I thought they might." Maia remarked coolly, preparing the dropship's defence grid for the attack. "Its a last ditch effort, they've got to keep us from getting on board the station. Prepare for evasive manoeuvres."

The torpedoes were rapidly approaching them for a head on collision, but Maia had been prepared for the contingency. Both she and Foster had worked out a plan of defence prior to this attack and she was glad they had done so. The two missiles were almost upon them when Maia forced the dropship to make a sharp bank to the right, allowing them passage straight past them. It would take a few seconds for the onboard guidance system to recalculate its sensors to pick up the pursuit again, but by then, Maia would be ready for them.

"They're beginning to recalculate." Foster announced quickly, with a touch of anxiousness to his voice.

"I've got them on target." She answered.

Flicking a button, she pushed the red button on her control stick and the dropship rocked with the sound of a sudden vacuum appearing somewhere on board. Both of them expected this however, for the vacuum was the result of the dropship's own plasma missiles launching from its mothership. Once they had been ejected, Maia and Foster kept track of them on the scopes as they went to keep their rendezvous with the Company missiles.

While the scopes in front of them registered the ensuing destruction of all missiles with no more than the disappearance of the indicators on the screen, outside, the scene was more fiery. A large explosion turned the darkness of the space outside into a white, hot conflagration for a few brief seconds. Like a candle that had been blown out, this momentary brilliance disappeared as the environmental conditions of vacuum space quashed out the flames in rapid succession.

"Well," Maia said with a smile, "that's that. Foster, open a line to the Company."

She was confident that there would be no further shows of force because they were almost at the station. To fire on them now was not only desperate but a fool hardy attempt. They would be inside the station by the time the missiles could even track them and Maia didn't think the Company would risk being damaged themselves. They knew a lot about inflicting misery on others, but nothing about being able to stomach it themselves.

"Captain," Foster spoke up, interrupting her thoughts. "They're on line now."

"Thank you." Maia replied and secured her headset firmly around her head, before speaking. "This is the dropship of the USS Sparta. Prepare to be boarded under the jurisdiction of the United Nations of Earth Army and the Security Division."

"USS Sparta dropship," the droning voice of what was obviously a low ranking docking officer, responded to her. "You are not authorised to land at this station. Please do not attempt to dock. You are instructed to return to your ship until further notification."

Maia was in a dark mood and had no patience to dealing with the little people of this station, especially ones possessing superior tones of authority that was obsolete. "Listen to me, you little asshole," Maia retorted. "I am coming on board whether or not I have fucking authorisation or not. My credentials just placed your Company authorisation on the same level as toilet paper. Now you open the damn docking doors or I'll torpedo myself an entrance. You got that?"

There was a momentary pause as he went to his confer with his superiors, Maia assumed, before he returned to her with a little more contrition in his voice. "You may land."

"Thank you." She replied icily.

Foster glanced at her with a brow raised. "I've never seen military authority put through so succinctly." He smiled.

"Its a talent." Maia winked at him.

The dropship sailed through the main doors of the flight deck on board the Weyland Yutani Space station, without any further complications from its personnel. Maia expected a reception committee waiting for her however. If Max was still on board, then he would need to kill her if any of this was to be salvaged. At the moment, Maia had sent Foster to the APC, where he was to immediately transmit everything that they had learnt to the UNE's military network, just in case anything happened to them before they could deliver the report in person.

However, there was also a very good chance that if the Company personnel, especially the rank and file who knew nothing of the experimentation on Fiorina, knew what their masters had been up to and how much trouble they were in, would adhere to her authority in order to escape implication. Maia however, didn't bank very much on any of these, she merely bided her time and decided to take everything as it happened.

Shortly after the dropship touched the floor of the hangar, Maia made her exit through the main hatch. She was still carrying her makeshift Pulse Rifle and flame thrower slung around her shoulder. The Company personnel working the flight deck fixed their attention on this strange, almost savage figure who had entered their station and presumed to take command of it. In their eyes, Maia also saw fear as it began to dawn upon them, that their activities here may not have been sanctioned by the powers that be and that they may have been misled into wrongdoing by their superiors.

In the corner of the deck, Maia saw Tasha Dorn arriving on the scene with a number of the station's security personnel following closely behind. Maia tried to guess if these men were Tasha Dorn's personnel entourage or were they merely attached to the station's security division. Maia didn't wait for the statuesque blond, dressed imposingly with her knee high boots, her riding breeches and flowing white shirt, to reach her. Instead the UNE officer searched the nearby area for a com panel and went towards it when she found one.

Activating the controls, she tapped into the station's external speaker, which would allow her to be heard by the entire complement on board. What she needed to say, required everyone's undivided attention and this device would see that she got it. "My name is Officer Maia Sanjay of the United Nations of Earth Security Division. Under that authority, I am empowered to take command of this facility. You will cease work immediately!"

With that, she turned to face the people in the room with her once again. They had not stopped working, but they hadn't exactly ignored her either. Most were standing about uncertain of what to do, some were afraid to obey her orders, especially with Tasha approaching her, but others were also too afraid to disobey her and the mood was one of confusion. However, Maia saw that same confusion in the faces of Dorn's security people and they were no longer certain of their loyalty to her.

"I'm afraid I am the only law around here, Maia." The woman declared when she reached Maia, wearing a smug expression on her face despite the circumstances. "They know that if they stop working, they will have me to contend with and at the moment, I am more of an immediate concern than any UNE officer."

"Oh really?" Maia said sceptically, unimpressed by this woman's posturing. "What about Max? I thought he was in charge."

"When Max is gone," Tasha shrugged, "I am in charge."

So Max was gone, Maia thought to herself. Of course he would flee before any of this mud stuck to him. He probably didn't anticipate her getting off the surface alive, especially when she never contacted him after making her threat. He had underestimated her greatly and he would pay dearly for that mistake. In the meantime however, Maia had other things to deal with. "I remember you now," Maia said addressing Tasha. "You were kicked out of the Security Division weren't you? What was the charge or shall I say charges? Corruption, bribery, conspiracy. If I recall you were kicked out because we didn't want to tarnish our image by dragging you through a lengthy trial."

"Whatever." Tasha retorted, unperturbed that Maia had dragged out her ugly personal history even though her security men were now even more dubious about her position. She noticed that they were standing further away from her, as if they were attempting to distance themselves from what seemed like an ugly conspiracy that would be accountable for, very soon. "I am still in charge here and these people know it."

"Look," Maia said with a sigh, not wanting to take this to the limit that Tasha was forcing her to. "I don't want you. I only want Yomato and Max. If you step aside, you can get out of here and crawl back under whatever mercenary rock you came from. I don't care what happens to you."

"I am disappointed," she replied. "I was hoping that the best UNE agent would have a little backbone."

Maia looked away and laughed shortly, even though she felt no humour. Suddenly, without warning, the UNE agent reached for the service revolver sitting in her belt and pulled it out. Before Tasha could even react to get away, Maia had discharged the weapon. A single gun shot was heard, but that was all that was really needed. Tasha Dorn staggered backwards, blood gushing from the reddish hole left by the bullet that had torn straight through her forehead and erupted out of the back of her skull in bloody efficiency. She was dead even before she touched the floor.

Maia looked at her impassively before remarking softly. "I warned you." II

Having seen how easily and expediently she had dispatched of Tasha Dorn, neither the station's security men or the personnel on board were ready to take her on. Which was just as well, because now that Maia had taken care of Tasha, she could address them station again and revealed to them what exactly their superiors had been up to during their tenure on Fiorina and in effect, reveal how much trouble all who were connected to projected, were really in.

"I will repeat myself," Maia spoke into the speakers again. "All research work in the station is to cease immediately Only those functions that are required for the maintenance of this station will be allowed to continue. Doctor Hikaru Yomato has been violated the Dangerous Organism Act, not to mention, several laws pertaining to ICCU Quarantine procedures and the murder of several Colonial Marine soldiers on the surface of the planet. If you do not wish to spend the next several years behind bars on Earth, I suggest you comply immediately and cooperate with me fully."

With this revealed, Maia looked up to see the workers listening to her intently with no opposition in their eyes. This was expected, after all, these people were merely cogs in the station's function, they knew nothing about the alien conspiracy or the needless death of so many innocents. These were Company workers who were in essence good people, working for a dirty organisation and they were not about to go down with Doctor Yomato or the people responsible for the debacle down on Fiorina.

The security team with Tasha Dorn took a little longer. They, themselves were unsure of what to do, especially since it had been revealed that their leader was a disgraced UNE officer and a mercenary to boot. They held firm, their hands still resting on their sidearms, a gesture that did not impress Maia not give her any patience.

"Stand down with you weapons, now!" Maia barked. After surviving a nest full of savage aliens, she wasn't about to get shot by a trigger happy Company cop.

Her demands seemed to be the straw for their resistance. She saw them studying what remained of their leader before facing her and recognising the authority she held. It was jungle rules out here and the stronger made way for the strongest in order to survive. Maia had exerted her power over them when she vanquished Tasha Dorn, that was enough to convince them to throw in their lot with her. The leader of the security team gave a slight nod to the others, before he stepped forward. He was an Asian whose name was stencilled on his uniform.

"We're at your disposal Officer Sanjay." He replied.

"Good," Maia nodded before glancing at the stencilled lettering on his breast pocket. "Wong, I want you and a few your men to go find and take into custody, Doctor Hikaru Yomato. Do you have a holding cell?"

"No." Wong answered automatically, "but I can hold him in his office and post guards at the door. He won't get out."

"That will do." Maia answered. "Please hold him there until I have a chance to talk to him. In the meantime, I need a medical team down here, my team has engaged highly dangerous organisms and I want them looked after."

After Maia had seen to the comfort of the remaining Marines who were still immobilise by the alien sedative, leaving in the capable hands of Foster and the Company's medical team, Maia went to find Doctor Yomato. True to his word, Wong had posted guards outside of Yomato's office where the doctor was currently being incarcerated. It was almost an hour later, after her arrival on the station that Maia Sanjay found herself face to face with Yomato.

For a long while neither spoke. Maia was content to watch him, while Yomato sat in his chair, taking on an air of quiet meditation and defiance. She knew that he would try to maintain a vigil, with determination not to speak. However, she doubted that he had any idea of the magnitude of charges that he was faced with. He probably thought that he would slither out of this with the aid of Company money, but Maia was about to bring the light of reality to crash down on his fanciful illusions.

But first she was going to start with a simple question.

"Was the alien queen the specimen you got from Ellen Ripley?"

That seemed to surprise Yomato, for he didn't think she would have known anything about the late Warrant Officer Ripley. He looked up at her in astonishment, before asking, "how did you know she was Fiorina."

"That doesn't matter, answer the question." She said coldly.

Yomato eased back into his chair, taking an air of smugness which meant he was going to remain silent. Maia's already strained impatience was reaching breaking point and his defiance only made her seething fury first. She rose from her chair and walked towards him slowly, her eyes never leaving his for an instance. Yomato stared at her confused, wondering what she was trying to do. Suddenly, without warning, Maia pulled out her service revolver and aimed the weapon at his face.

"Now we can do this the hard way, or we can do this the easy way. The choice is up to you completely. You can tell me what I want to know, right here and now and I will let you return to Earth to stand trial for your crimes. We may even be able to work out some form of amnesty with the UNE if you agree to testify against the Company about the alien. You are small fry, the UNE wants the Weyland Yutani Corporation and I'm betting they will be willing to lose you in the system when the shit hits the fan. Either way you will be far away from here, safe and untarnished. Or," Maia cocked the weapon and Yomato's eyes widened with terror, "I can blow your fucking head off right here and now, and raid your computer over your dead body and get what I need anyway!"

Yomato swallowed hard, seeing the rage in her eyes and knowing with complete certainty that she was not bluffing. That she would carry out her threat and his scientific integrity such as it is, was not worth the price of his life. "What do you want to know?" He asked shakily.

"I want to know," Maia said lowering her weapon down and taking a step away from the trembling scientist. "If the alien queen in the hive on Fiorina was the specimen you got from Ellen Ripley."

"No." He said quickly, all resistance and defiance evaporated from his face. "I don't know anything about Ripley except of what I read from the reports on the alien, left by my predecessor. She apparently committed suicide by jumping into a vat of molten steel, killing herself and the alien queen she carried."

At least Maia knew for certain now, because she didn't believe that Yomato was brave enough to tell a lie. Ellen Ripley had died the way she lived, bravely and on her own terms. At least, for her that was something. "The hive is gone." Maia looked up at him. "Your sensors probably detected the blast when the dropship's self destruct mechanism detonated, but not the nukes that were on board. The aliens and their hive are gone. I personally destroyed the alien queen."

"You can't have!" Yomato gasped in horror. "That project was thirty years in the making! You have no idea the work that went into creating a perfect environment for the alien! All we could have learnt from it!" His face eclipsed with anguish and Maia couldn't believe what she was hearing. It appalled her to no end. Thirty years of study and these people still had no idea what they were dealing with.

"You don't understand do you?" Maia looked at him with disgust. "All you see is an experiment, a chance at a perfect bio-weapon. I believe that you could possibly keep them in a controlled environment for some time, but sooner or later, they'll escape. There has never been an infallible prison, someone always gets out. If these things get out, if they reached Earth, don' t you know what's going to happen? Everyone loses. Everyone! Each egg that an alien lays is a potential queen, am I right? Before you know even what hit you, those things will be everywhere and you are going to here the survivors outraged screams from Mars!"

Yomato didn't seemed to care and why should he? He was a scientist, totally confident in his power to control something that was beyond control. The aliens had always been on Fiorina for him, safe and removed from being a threat to him. He didn't have any idea of what it was like being face to face with one of those things and then trying to get away with your life. Yomato lay slumped over his desk, sobbing for the project that had cost so many their lives. Maia didn't feel any pity for his remorse, nor was she quite finished with him yet.

"When we get back to Earth, I am going to see to it that someone is sent to LV427 and destroy the derelict space craft where the aliens were originally found. One way or another, your experiment is over."

**************

A day later, Maia finally left the space station and returned to the Sparta. During that time, she had raided Yomato's computer systems and had Foster download all the information stored in his private files, regarding the alien project. With what she had found in those secret files, Maia had accumulated enough evidence to bury Weyland Yutani forever. Yomato was transferred to the Sparta where he was tucked into hypersleep so he could accompany Maia back to Earth.

All in all, she was totally exhausted. Maia couldn't even remember the last time she had gotten any sleep and her body was running on nothing but adrenalin. It was the first time in her life Maia looked forward to going into hypersleep, for she knew that when she finally slept, she would be out for days. So it might as well be six months instead. Still, she was strangely satisfied at what had been accomplished since her return from Fiorina and it pleased her to know that the dead would be vindicated when she returned to Earth.

The Marines had been returned to the Sparta once Foster had ensured they were well enough to travel. They suffered no permanent damage and it was discovered that the aliens had the ability to immobilise its potential hosts by injecting them through stinger appendages, a fast acting sedative which kept them unconscious until they were ready for embryo implantation. Their survival had been fortunate, especially when Maia thought of all those who never left Fiorina. Some of their deaths had been utterly horrifying and when Maia thought of that, she naturally thought of Yates and O'Neill. She knew that from now on, her dreams would be filled with obscenities that moved in the dark and death that was a pleasant alternative in comparison to what lurked out there in space.

Where no one could hear you scream.

Maia was pleased to see the ship when again, when she stepped off the dropship into the Sparta. It was odd how clean and fresh everything seemed after being on Fiorina. The Sparta's predictable lines and familiar surroundings put her at ease. She saw MacReady waiting for her as she disembarked off the vessel and found that she was also happy to see him. Secretly, she wished she was in better shape to greet him, but then decided who would really care?

MacReady did of course.

He could tell instantly that she was exhausted and her physical appearance didn't help matters much either. She was still wearing her flight suit which had become filthy from dirt, resin and blood while her skin was covered with lacerations, slight acid burns and blisters. The dark circles under her eyes indicated that she had hardly slept, even after returning from Fiorina to safe ground and he guessed that she was walking on her last legs.

"You look like hell." He remarked as he reached her.

"Thanks," Maia replied with a faint smile, being in no position to argue. "How about you? Are you feeling alright?"

"We're all fine." MacReady said soberly standing in front of her and looking her in the eye. "Thanks to you. You saved us all, Maia. Don't think we'll forget it." He put an arm around her waist and offered his shoulder as support. It was a gesture Maia was more than happy to accept and she placed her weary head on his broad shoulder.

"I know you won't." She whispered softly, savouring the feeling of being so close to him. Until now, she didn't realise how much she needed to be near him, to have someone to share all this with. It felt good.

"Come on," he said with a smile as he rubbed his chin in her hair. "I'll walk you to the showers."

Neither of them spoke for a long while as they walked down the silent corridors of the Sparta, which was even more quiet now that most of them were gone. To both MacReady and Maia, the silence seemed disheartening and sad at the same time. It was a far cry from the noise and life she had known when she had first come on board the Sparta. Now it seemed almost haunted.

"Maia," MacReady finally broke the silence. "What happened to Yates and Devine?"

Maia paused and swallowed hard, still feeling a lump in her throat when she thought about Yates. Especially Yates. "Devine never made it to the APC, " she answered. "He was torn apart by aliens. There wasn't much when I found him."

"And Yates?" He looked at her, knowing that something terrible had happened to the medic. He could see it in Maia's darkened eyes.

"Yates," Maia said after releasing a deep breath. "Yates wasn't that lucky." Maia could feel long overdue tears starting to come, but she held it. Her cracking voice betrayed her however. "They succeeded in implanting her with an embryo. I found her in the same place I found all of you, but she was the first one they got and it was too late. All I could do was end it quickly, like she asked.

MacReady closed his eyes, trying to compose himself as the pain took hold of him as well. He thought of that sweet young woman and felt that she deserved better than to die that way. "I had a feeling that was what happened." He said softly after a moment. "When we woke up and she wasn't t there, we all knew it. No one wanted to admit it until we knew for sure."

"I encountered the queen alien while I was there." Maia said staring vacantly ahead. In front of them as a large window, revealing the wide expanse of stars ahead of them.

"Jesus," he exclaimed softly.

"Yeah," she smiled sardonically, looking ahead once again. "She was big and she was terrifying. But I think we shared a moment there, when I was standing face to face with her, woman to woman I guess. She knew I was there, she looked at me and even though she had no eyes, she saw me. She looked at me like she had won. Like she and her kind always would. It was like it didn't matter that I was going to kill her, because death doesn't have the same kind of meaning for them that it does for us. No matter how many times I killed her, it wouldn't matter because her children are us. That in the end, we would die so that her children will live."

"The bitch is gone now." MacReady said rubbing her shoulder in comfort. "She and her children can hurt nobody any more."

"No she isn't." Maia shook her head and looked him straight in the eye. "She isn't gone and this is far from being over. The aliens down there on Fiorina are gone, that's all that is certain."

"There won't be any more after we get the derelict on LV427." He said firmly. "That'll be the end of them, right?"

"Mac," Maia looked at him with pity in her eyes. Pity because he didn't understand the full implications of what she was trying to tell him and he desperately wanted to know what she was talking about. He wanted to share the light of what she had discovered. "The derelict ship carrying the original alien eggs crashed on LV427. It didn't come from there. Somewhere out there," she looked away and gestured towards the window, revealing the stars, "somewhere out there, there is an entire planet of these things and someday, we're going to land on it and she'll find us all over again."

And the stars, which always looked so pure and beautiful to Corporal Kevin MacReady, suddenly became as black as the alien's empty soul.

EPILOGUE

EARTH:

SIX MONTHS LATER

The evening had gone well.

Far better than he had ever anticipated actually. He had felt a little nervous initially, for there had been little occasion during his career for him to become closely acquainted with Company executives, however, tonight the dinner party he had hosted had gone smoothly, without any awkward moments. His guests had been well placed men in the corporate sector and Maximillian Remar felt gratified that they had allowed him entry into their elite circle of influence.

In the past, he had been painfully aware of how they had distanced themselves from him. After all, it was no secret that relations between the UNE and Weyland Yutani Corporation were far from amiable. And he being the head of the Security Division meant being the UNE's hatchet man. But those days seemed far away now. He was one of them, and Max who had only recently retired, had been surprised when several of those important men at his party, offered him high paying Company jobs, which he would seriously consider over the next few days. Initially, he had planned to leave Earth to buy himself a small asteroid with the money he had received for his work on the alien project and spend the rest of his years in quiet indulgence. However, the offers made tonight were exceedingly generous and much too good for him to just dismiss without any consideration.

Max left the dining hall to the staff in his penthouse suite and made his way to his den. Entering the carpeted room, he glanced out the huge picture window for a moment, basking in the sprawling view of the city below him for a few seconds, before settling down in his favourite chair, behind a rather expensive oak desk. Reaching for the humidor on it, he produced a cigar. Once he lit it, he swivelled around in his chair and faced the window once again.

"Those things will kill you Max."

The voice that broke the silence of his private sanctuary made Max Remar face front again. He knew the voice but for a moment, couldn't believe that it was true. Not until he turned around and found himself staring into its speaker's face. Maia Sanjay stood before him, wearing a dark jumpsuit which he knew as standard infiltration wear. She was holding a gun and it was pointed steadily at him. Maia had been waiting for Max to arrive for the better part of the night. She had arrived at about the same time as his guests, and had spent most of the evening here, waiting for him to come into his private sanctuary once he had finished his entertaining.

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes wide with disbelief. For a moment, it seemed to Maia that he thought he was staring at a ghost, or a hallucination. He probably couldn't decide which was worse, she thought. Still, Max was a professional and his initial shock evaporated from his face to reveal cool indifference. Easing back into his chair, he exhaled the odious smoke produced from his cigar, letting it foul the air, before meeting her gaze once again.

Neither said nothing, and Maia crossed the room quickly, placing herself in a chair facing the desk, so that she could keep her gun firmly on him when she said what she had come here to say. Whether or not he could see the hidden fury in her eyes, Maia wasn't sure and Max was not about to reveal it even if he did. However, they both knew what she was capable of and even though he had underestimated her once, Maia wasn't arrogant enough to believe that he would do so again.

"Interesting crowd you run with now, Max." Maia remarked, glaring at him. "All very important Company men. I think I recognised a few directors and even a Department head. You're in the elite circles now I guess."

"One makes strange bedfellows in our business." He answered unperturbed and wondered what was on her mind, because he couldn't tell if she had come here to kill him or not.

"If you weren't already on the pay-roll, I'd suggest you should give some of those job offers serious consideration, but then you're very versatile aren't you?" She looked at him, with a raised brow.

Max let out a deep breath, meeting her eyes with a look of boredom. "Must you persist in this dramatic posturing? Get on with what you came here to say, or did you just intend to kill me?"

"I apologise for my prattling," Maia remarked with a tone of humility in her voice. "It seems that I must be getting philosophical in my old age, wounds of war, you understand." She raised her eyes and let out a faint smile, "actually I came here to tell you that you'd better enjoy these social gatherings while they last, because there isn't going to be much celebrating when I bring the Company down."

Max's eyes widened in surprised and then he laughed. Maia felt no anger at his outburst, because he didn't know what she did. Instead, she waited for his laughter to die down so that she could hear what his response to her threat would be. A minute later, she was not disappointed. "Maia," he said smugly. "What happened to you on Fiorina can be blamed on one lone scientist who took matters into his own hands and let a lot of innocent people die. Weyland Yutani is a big corporation, it cannot be held accountable for what one renegade does."

"Under normal circumstances, Max, you would be right." Maia nodded. "But these are any thing but normal circumstances. You see, at this moment, Yomato is on Earth. He is in UNE custody and he feels that he has enough evidence to prove that he was under orders and since its always been the Company we've been after, they've given him amnesty in exchange for his testimony. He had brought with him records, names, dates and reports, all which have evidence to support Company endorsement."

Max attempted to hide the shock on his face, but the magnitude of what he had learnt was beyond his capability of doing so. He knew the implications of what she had just told him and Yomato knew of the extent of his involvement. Even if the Company did escape the scandal, he would not and the UNE Security Division would not be at all forgiving. Under the Planetary Security Act, they could have him terminated tonight if they desired.

"I take it then, that Tasha Dorn is dead?" Max asked softly, trying to hide the fact that she had shaken him.

"Very much so." Maia said in response. "But please," she looked at him with the barest hint of a sneer on her face. "Let me continue. Yomato is only one of the nails I'm putting into the Company Records. I found on the station, an alien specimen. It was dead fortunately, and perfectly preserved, I brought it back to Earth, along with every gigabyte of information regarding the project, from Yomato's own personal computer. I also have a dying statement from Ellen Ripley, the original survivor of the Nostromo, implicating the Company's involvement. Yesterday, I got a warrant from the Attorney General's office to enter Weyland Yutani premises and purge their computers. I selected an office on the far side of the planet and left guards there to ensure that no one would inform their central headquarters. I'm afraid I've got all I've need to make a very nice case against them."

"Very commendable, Maia." Max replied reluctantly, but he wasn't about to show her that he was afraid. At least not yet. "But why are you telling me all this? If any of this were true, there would be a squad of our people outside my doorstep, waiting to take me in."

"I know that Max," Maia nodded slowly and some emotion began to filter through the impregnable mask she had been wearing. "Fortunately, since I had access to all the information, I was necessary to erase your name from any implicative material. I also told Yomato that if he so much as mentioned you, I was going to find him no matter where we hid him and I would kill him. He seemed to believe me and I've made Tasha Dorn a scapegoat."

He looked at her with disappointment, unable to believe the extent of her emotions. She still cared about him. After everything he had done to her, she still cared about him. "I knew you wouldn't let an old friend down."

Maia looked at him with a raised brow, amused at how he had misinterpreted her actions. Her fury still burnt hot and so did her vengeance. "Don't flatter yourself Max, I didn't do it for you. I did it for the organisation. I wasn't about to let the mess Weyland Yutani was going to be in, stain the UNE Security Division as well. I didn't want the good guys to get caught in the scandal because of you. The media will crucify the Company for what they've done and I've got to much respect for our people to let that happen to them as well."

Max nodded in understanding, but calculation set in his eyes again. He could use her love for the organisation to get him out of this mess. There was still time to salvage this situation he was embroiled in. "I knew you would survive Fiorina," he responded with a smile of pride, both of them knew was false. "Somehow, almost unconsciously, I knew that you were too resourceful to end your days on that rock, you always knew how to get yourself out of trouble no matter what the situation. Even when the odds are against you, you've always managed to launch a formidable attack."

Maia said nothing to his flattery, for she was too experienced an officer to believe any of it. She merely listened to him with no reaction on her face to any of his words, because he had yet to realise why she had come here for and that was his gravest mistake. After a lengthy silence, once he had concluded his speech, Maia replied. "Max, I got away because I was lucky. The others who came with me, were not. Nine of them died down there, torn to shreds by those alien bastards. Those weren't opponents, Max, they were predators, and I was damn lucky to get out alive."

"It was nothing personal." Max shrugged, starting to realise that she may have had an ulterior motive for coming here, other than to tell him that the Company was coming down. "It was business." As he spoke, his fingers inched towards the drawer in front of him on his desk. Hidden among his papers, was a weapon.

"Don't bother going for the gun," Maia said abruptly raising her other hand and showing him the gun he had been intending to reach, as she held it in the air. "I've cleaned out your desk and the rest of the arsenal."

Max's shoulder slumped forward in defeat, wondering what he could do now. He said nothing because he was thinking hard, thinking of some way to get out of here alive. He couldn't find it. Meanwhile, Maia had rose from her seat and had taken steps towards him. When she paused, she was standing directly in front of his desk, staring down into his increasingly frightened face.

"I don't know for sure whether or not any of this will result in the Company's down fall Max," Maia said softly. "But if the truth be known, if I can' t get them I will be quite frankly, satisfied with just you."

"You're taking this rather personally," Max glared at her. "Could it be you actually cared about those grunts?" He shook his head in disgust. "How very unprofessional of you Maia, I thought I taught you better. Lower the gun Maia," he said with a sigh. "Forget about those nonentities and we'll talk about compensation for your troubles. Ten million stretches well."

Although she was appalled by his presumption, she was hardly surprised and in no mood to continue this conversation any longer. "Goodbye Max."

"Maia wait..." He rose to speak.

Unfortunately, he never got the chance. With the silencer that was fixed on the barrel of her gun, Maia emptied the entire magazine into his face. The first shot had been taken in the centre of his forehead, so he never even had time to scream, but by the time he did fall on to the carpeted floor, his face was a bloody pulp which was almost unrecognisable. When it was done, she stared at his dead corpse for a few moments, unable to push away the feelings of remorse and pain. He had been a good man once, a man that all the officers of the UNE had looked up to, she didn't know what twisted those noble ideas, but she didn't want his shame to tarnish the good deeds of a lifetime of loyal service.

Maia returned Max's gun to his dead hands and replaced all the weapons that she had found in his den, to their original positions. She went to the safe which he had hidden predictably behind a painting, and proceeded to open it. Earlier on, she had cracked the combination and removed a bounty of almost ten million credits. Max obviously didn't trust banks. She had closed it then to avoid any signs of detection, but such an action was no longer needed. Once the safe was open, she left the door ajar, to complete the effect.

When she had made certain that all was as it had to be, Maia Sanjay departed the way she had came.

********

The storm broke within the week.

The Attorney General of the UNE after offering several warrants for investigation, finally received his reward from General Stephen Hanlon, in the form of devastating evidence proving the Weyland Yutani Corporation of several crimes, the least of which was murder.

The six months that followed were filled with endless court-room dramas behind closed doors, hidden away from the public eyes. The trial of the Weyland Yutani Corporation was easily the largest case of corruption and mismanagement, since the Watergate Scandal, centuries ago. For years the UNE had been waiting patiently for the Company to make a mistake, so they could dismantle the corporation once and for all and revoke the planetary concessions given to it so long ago. Concessions they had used to commit one crime after another.

With the evidence given by Yomato, the UNE acted and it acted swiftly. In the past, the Company had flouted its authority in bald arrogance and now no one was forgetting. While it would be impossible to completely force the closure of the Company, for it was an organisation that employed millions. However, the UNE had already taken measures to see that the infrastructure of the Company remained intact, if not its leaders. Almost every member of the Weyland Yutani's Board of Directors were placed under criminal indictment, their fates pending the outcome of the trial.

None of Weyland Yutani's troubles were ever linked to the death of Maximillian Remar, the revered leader of the UNE Security Division. He had been buried with a hero's farewell, with a state funeral that saw every government official of importance in attendance. His death had been labelled a senseless killing. The police had theorised that one evening, Max had surprised burglars attempting to rob his safe and was subsequently killed though the method of his death was somewhat brutal. Still, thieves who were surprised, were rarely predictable and the theory held fast. The killer or killers were never caught and the case still remains unsolved.

Maia watched the dismantling of the Weyland Yutani Corporate ladder incognito. During the trial, she had been disguised as one of the General's aides and allowed to watch the proceedings unencumbered. When the verdict came in, she like everyone else in the room, held their breath in anticipation of what the judgement would be. And when that same verdict was delivered, the Company, the great Weyland Yutani Corporation was no more. Instead, government officials would be placed in direct control of the company and it would now be known as BioNational.

The new BioNational Foundation was to become a closely affiliated branch of the UNE's Department of Commerce and Trade. Thus after almost three centuries, the Company was broken. The public knew none of the specifics of the indictments which brought about the great collapse. Everyone was too elated by the fact that the Weyland Yutani's Corporation was no longer in existence to care how such a thing came about.

II

For Maia, there was one more thing left for her to do.

Something that only she was capable of doing.

As she stood before the doorway of a nice Classic American house, in a tree lined avenue somewhere in Connecticut, she knew it was the least she could do for the memory of one brave woman's whose dying testimony had reached not only her own heart, but the hearts of everyone who had been present at the trials. No more deeply, did the deaths of all those people reach the tribunal presiding over the Company's indictments, than that of Ellen Ripley's. Her odyssey through a century of loss and peril, delivered a more fatal blow to the Company's credibility than any shred of evidence that Maia was able to produce.

Maia knocked lightly on the door and had to wait for only a moment, before someone answered it. It was an old fashioned door, one that used hinges instead of hydraulics and thus when it opened, swung backwards smoothly on those archaic implements. The woman who stood at the doorway was rapidly greying, with fine lines beginning to appear along her eyes. She regarded Maia with curiosity before she spoke.

"Can I help you?" She asked politely.

"I'd like to speak to Ellen St Clair?" Maia ventured to ask.

"I'm Ellen St Clair," the woman responded, "how can I help you?

Maia smiled faintly, wondering what this woman would think of what she had come here to say. "Maybe I can help you, would it be possible for us to speak inside?"

After a few seconds, the woman nodded and allowed her into the house.

One of the first things that Maia had done when she returned to Earth, was to investigate any record of Ellen Ripley's family. She had not done this previously, because it had not important to the mission she had been working on. However, now that she had the time, Maia wanted her family at least to know of Ellen's bravery and perhaps answer the questions they surely had regarding her disappearance. It hadn't taken much digging to learn that Ripley had a daughter and that child had died an old woman three years before the Narcissus, the life pod she had taken her long hypersleep in, had been discovered. Due to grief or whatever disillusionment that she must have felt, Ellen Ripley never bothered to find out that she had family through the brother she had believed to be dead by now.

Michael Ripley did have children and the youngest of those was a woman called Ellen, whom he named after the sister who never returned from space. Maia sought out Ellen St Clair, who know lived in Connecticut with her own family. Ellen St Clair was in her seventies and Maia counted herself lucky that she was still able to find someone who might actually remember something of an aunt she would have only heard about in stories.

Upon entering Ellen St Clair's house, Maia went on to explain Ripley's disappearance. How the Nostromo had been called on to make its ill fated voyage to Acheron and then Ripley's long hypersleep for 57 years and finally her return to space once again, where she never returned this time. Maia told Ripley's niece, about her aunt's bravery, how she had fought hard to survive and to save everyone she knew and cared about, from the alien threat. Even to the end when she had given her life.

Ellen St Clair listened and said nothing as she heard the noble eulogy for an aunt her father had talked about most affectionately. Remembering how her father had gone to the Company demanding news regarding his sisters disappearance and never receiving a satisfactory answer. Hoping beyond hope that she would some day return, and going to his death never knowing the truth. When Maia finished, Ellen released a sigh of relief.

"At least, now we know." The old woman sighed longingly. "My father talked about her all the time. She was his big sister and he loved her very much. He always said I reminded him of her, but I never knew to see the similarities. I just wished she had contacted me when she returned to Earth."

"Try and see it from her point of view," Maia said gently. "To you, Michael Ripley was your father. To her, he was her brother, her younger brother. I don't think she wanted to face coming to you and seeing a niece that was older than she was. Maybe she just felt that you didn't need the complication of an aunt that seemed like something of a relic. Perhaps it was for the best that she stayed away."

"Maybe you're right." Ellen nodded, having no words to contradict her. "Having heard what you've said though, makes me wish that I had known her."

"Me too." Maia admitted. "I think it would have been something to know her."

"I think you do," Ellen commented. "Better than you think."

Maia only wished that were true.

**************

The office of General Hanlon hadn't really changed during all the time that she had been away and the months that followed since her return. Hanlon was a man of unchanging tastes and Maia was not surprised to see that everything in the man's office was completely the same as before. As Maia sat in a chair in front of his desk, waiting for the good General to arrive, she couldn't help but think how much had happened since she was last here.

"It is good to see you again," Hanlon said, announcing himself as he entered the room.

"Likewise General," Maia said with genuine pleasure. In the past months, Maia had come to know Hanlon quite well and the man was one of the few people who said what was on his mind without dallying with petty cordialities. She liked a man who was direct. After Max, it was very refreshing.

"I heard you took a leave of absence from the UNE." He pointed out as he sat down.

"I had things to do." She looked at him, and he knew exactly what those were. It had been his privilege that Maia had chosen him to act as mediator between herself and the Attorney General's office. It was his clout, that had gotten the investigation started in the first place.

Hanlon pursed his lips as if he had something to say. "You know," he spoke after a moment of deliberation. "The families of the dead Marines have come into very good fortune recently. All of them have received large amounts of money, sent to them anonymously. Altogether, ten million worth."

Maia raised an amused brow, meeting his eyes before replying in cool stead. "Its a crazy world."

Hanlon nodded and he understood. There would be no more said on the subject. He had been aware of Max Remar's deceit, and it was at her request that he remained silent about what he knew. Changing the subject abruptly, he cleared his throat and said what was on his mind. "Actually, I asked you here because I have a proposition to offer you?"

"Really?" Maia looked at him.

"I have been talking to the new UNE Security Division Head." He began, "and despite the problems encountered by the Fiorina mission. One thing was evident."

"What's that?" Maia inquired, her voice full of suspicion now.

"That you and the Marines did quite well together. In fact, you worked so well together that we wondered if you would consider retaining your rank as Captain and take charge of a new Colonial Marine team, we're assembling at this moment. These include the survivors of Fiorina course." Hanlon watched her reaction, remembering a blatant refusal and expecting one. However, he didn't get that from her, what he did get was Maia actually considering the idea with calm deliberation.

"Will I still retain my UNE status?" Maia asked. "I've always been a Network player, I'm too used to it to give it all up and I want access to the organisation."

"Certainly," Hanlon answered eagerly. At this point, he was ready to give her anything she wanted. Personnel like her did not come along often and it was a waste to let her slip past him, when he could prevent it.

"Well," Maia said releasing a held breath. "To tell you the truth, I've been looking for a change of pace, especially after Fiorina. So if you're willing to take me on General, I accept."

"Excellent." He beamed with genuine delight. "I promise, you won't regret it."

III

Almost a month after that meeting, Maia finally saw MacReady on board Gateway Station. She had learnt from Hanlon that he had been promoted to Master Sergeant replacing the position held by Parker, in the training of the new Marines. As she approached him in the large compound, she saw Marin, Quinn and Addison in the distance, supervising the new recruits. MacReady hardly noticed her arrival, as he was too busy going through the papers attached to his clipboard.

"Hello soldier." Maia announced herself.

MacReady looked up instantly and broke into a wide grin. "Long time no see," he remarked leaning over and planting a lingering kiss on her lips. "Where have you been?"

"Busy." Maia answered, not wanting to go into the whole Company thing just yet. Looking around, she saw her new team amidst their training. "Look's like you're busy too." She remarked, gesturing to the new Marines corp cadets running the obstacle course in the distance.

"Yeah," he nodded with a hint of pride in his eyes, he was obviously pleased by their progress. "They're a little green, but they'll be okay in the long run. I'm just trying to get them ready for when the new commander arrives in two weeks."

"I see," Maia nodded facetiously. "Know who that is yet?"

"No." He shook his head." But I did make Sergeant thought." He replied gesturing to the stripes on his shirt.

"Congratulations," Maia smiled, genuinely happy for him. After Fiorina, he deserved the promotion.

"What about you?" He asked. "I thought it was Boston for you."

"I'm not ready for retirement just yet." She answered.

"I'm glad to hear that." He smiled. "Listen, I'm going to be done here for the day, pretty soon. How about I buy you dinner."

"I'd like that." Maia nodded, suddenly remembering the kiss they had shared in the bowels of the dropship during the very worst of their Fiorina mission. He was undoubtedly the most attractive man she had ever met and her feelings for him ran deep. Neither would they be denied. She didn't know how that was going to be when she took command of the new team, but she was experienced enough to know that she would be able to keep her romantic affiliations aside from her professional ones. She had a feeling that MacReady would be like that too.

"As soon as you're done." She nodded smiling. Leaning over, she returned his kiss and his lips felt as warm and inviting now as when they had been on Fiorina 361. When she parted from him a moment later, Maia began walking a few steps away before she paused and looked back at him. "By the way, you may have to start calling me Captain again."

Realisation flooded into his eyes after a few seconds, when it dawned upon him what she was talking about. With an expression of amusement on his face, because he wasn't displeased by the prospect and he respected her work any way, MacReady finally replied. "You're kidding."

"Would I lie to you?" Maia grinned.

MacReady watched her leave, the memory of her smile and her kiss still fresh in his mind. He didn't mind her being his commanding officer, but he had a feeling, she was going to be a handful.

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THE END