Six was still examining the data on the tablet when she paused, her fingers hovering over the glass.
“Alex.”
Alexandra glanced down.
“What?”
“I’ve got a human life sign in Zone 31. Power Control Room.”
Alexandra stared at the screen.
Ripley.
She already knew who that had to be.
“Alone?” Alexandra asked, her voice dropping.
“As far as I can tell,” Six replied through the audio feed, her tone level and unhurried.
“One single life sign.”
Before Alexandra could answer, a cold, flat voice rang directly inside her head:
[Mandatory Subplot: protect the protagonist Ripley. Ensure her survival for five hours. Reward: 3,000 reward points and a Rank C reward. Failure results in a 6,000 reward points deduction.]
Alexandra stopped dead in the corridor.
Three thousand.
Yeah.
There was a reason God was paying that much.
It wasn’t a gift.
It was a trap.
She had no idea what God had altered this time around.
She wasn’t ignoring a mandatory order with a six-thousand-point penalty attached to it.
“Keep watching the feeds, Six. I’m going to check it out.”
When Alexandra reached the narrow approach to Zone 31, she found a heavy metal door with a red warning light pulsing above it.
“Open it,” she murmured.
The door hissed open, spilling pale light and swirling dust across the floor.
As the air cleared, Alexandra saw the dark, blunt barrel of a flamethrower pointed straight at her face.
Behind it stood a woman, grimed with soot, her hair tangled and her hands trembling slightly on the weapon.
“Is it you? Ripley…?”
Alexandra’s voice was low.
Alexandra had watched the film enough times to know exactly who she was.
Seeing Ripley here, filthy and terrified with a flamethrower in her hands, was still strange.
Alexandra looked almost absurdly out of place on the Nostromo.
She was young, blonde, and strikingly put together even after everything that had happened, but her white Widow-style suit looked as though she had been dragged through a war zone.
Holes and acid-burned sections marked the material across her torso and arm, and a wide tear opened up her right thigh.
Dried blood and dark soot covered parts of the fabric.
Her skin was flushed, and her hair was messy and damp with sweat.
The flamethrower lowered an inch.
“Phew… thank goodness it’s not those things. Oh. It’s you, Alexandra.” Ripley let out a ragged, trembling breath, leaning heavily against the doorframe.
“Those monsters appeared out of nowhere. We barely had time to wake you up from the cryo-tubes. I didn’t think anyone else made it out. What about the others?”
“We got separated,” Alexandra said simply.
“Why are you hiding out here alone?”
Ripley sighed, her shoulders slumping as the tension finally bled out of her for a fraction of a second.
“Ahoo got me down here before the bulkheads dropped. We answered that automated distress signal, and one of our crew… he brought something back from the derelict ship. A creature. It killed him, and then it started hunting the rest of us through the Nostromo. This is the only room on this level with a door thick enough to keep them out.”
Ripley’s eyes were heavy with exhaustion.
“Are you hurt?”
“No,” Ripley muttered, shaking her head.
“Just tired. And sick of hiding.”
Alexandra paused, slinging her pack off her shoulder and unzipping it just enough to block Ripley’s view as she reached inside.
A moment later, she pulled out a few sealed rations and a bottle of clean water, handing them over.
“Here. Eat something.”
Ripley stared at the food for a second before grabbing it.
She didn’t care about the source or the presentation; she tore the packaging open and began eating immediately, half-starved from hours of terror and hiding.
Ripley swallowed the last mouthful and lowered the empty packet into her lap.
For the first time since Alexandra had opened the door, she seemed to have enough energy to actually look at her.
Her eyes moved over Alexandra’s suit.
There were holes across the white material, several of them blackened around the edges.
The fabric along Alexandra’s thigh had been torn open completely.
Dried blood covered parts of the suit, mixed with dark stains from whatever had burned through it.
Ripley’s expression changed.
“You’re hurt.”
Alexandra glanced down at herself.
“I look worse than I feel.”
Ripley’s eyes moved back to her thigh.
The skin visible through the torn suit was slightly red, as though irritated, but otherwise completely normal.
“That doesn’t look like something you just walk away from.”
Alexandra gave her a tired smile, letting a trace of annoyance cross her face.
“It was a rough fight.”
“With one of those things?”
“Yeah.”
Ripley hesitated, her gaze dropping to Alexandra’s feet.
“Then why aren’t you limping?”
Alexandra looked down at her leg again.
She held Ripley’s gaze without changing expression.
Years of acting had taught her how to keep her face calm when someone was searching it for an answer.
“Guess I got lucky,” Alexandra said smoothly.
Ripley looked at the holes again.
“Most?”
“Enough.”
“Trust me,” Alexandra said softly, her voice warm and steady.
“I’m not complaining.”
Ripley swallowed hard and rubbed a hand over her face.
Her shoulders sagged again.
She nodded slowly, pushing herself away from the wall.
“Why are you helping me?” Ripley asked quietly.
Alexandra shrugged.
“Because you’re here.”
Ripley stared at her for a moment.
“Come on,” Alexandra said, glancing around the cramped, ransacked room.
“You can ask me questions after we’re somewhere safer.”
Several decks away, the atmosphere in the control room was thick enough to choke on.
Zha stumbled through the heavy door first, one hand pressed hard against his side, his breath coming in ragged gasps.
Lan came after her, her knees shaking as she caught herself against the edge of the central console.
Jie entered right behind them, breathing heavily and supporting his own weight, but still on his feet.
Neither Zha nor Lan looked seriously injured, but all three carried the exhausted appearance of people who had spent the last several minutes running for their lives.
Xuan looked up from the monitors.
“The creatures were as strong as the ones we encountered earlier?”
Zha wiped the blood from his forehead with the back of his hand.
“At least as strong. We barely made it through that section. If my body hadn’t pushed past its usual limits for those few seconds, we’d both be dead down there.”
Xuan watched Zha for a moment.
Again.
He had seen it before.
Zha could push himself beyond his normal limits under enough pressure.
Xuan still had no way to predict when it would happen or how long it would last.
Useful.
Unreliable.
Xuan returned his attention to the ship’s layout.
Escape pods.
The obvious choice.
Reach them, launch, leave the Nostromo behind.
But the route was unknown, the ship was full of narrow corridors, and the Xenomorphs had already demonstrated that they could move through the vessel faster than the humans could.
Too much uncertainty.
The ship itself could become a weapon.
Its doors, corridors, and isolation sections could control where the Xenomorphs moved.
“Then we have a problem,” Xuan said.
Lan looked at him.
“What kind?”
“We have two choices. We can retreat toward the escape pods and attempt to leave the ship, or we can stay here and eliminate the creatures before we make our way out.”
Zha frowned.
“Can we even reach the pods?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how are we supposed to retreat?”
“We aren’t.” Xuan brought several sections of the ship into view.
The Nostromo was a maze of narrow corridors, sealed doors, and interconnected rooms.
The creatures could move through the ship more freely than they could, and every corridor became a possible place for an attack.
“If we run toward the escape pods now, they will have the advantage. We would be moving through their territory without knowing how many are waiting ahead of us.”
Lan studied the display.
Jie stood beside her, looking from the corridors on the screen to Xuan.
“And if we stay?” Lan asked.
“We decide where the fighting happens.”
Zha stared at the map.
Stronger.
Faster.
But they don’t control the ship.
If the security system could isolate them, they could choose where the fighting happened.
Zha finally nodded.
“Fine. We stay.” He looked at Xuan.
“How?”
“We use them against themselves.” Xuan enlarged one of the corridors.
“The creatures are aggressive. They pursue living targets once they detect them, and they have already demonstrated that they will follow someone for a considerable distance. If we can draw several of them into one section of the ship, we can close the isolation doors behind them.”
Lan’s eyes moved over the map.
“And then?”
“Then we kill them.”
Nobody spoke for several seconds.
Xuan continued before anyone could object.
“The problem is getting them into the right position. We need someone to draw them in.”
Zha’s expression changed.
“A bait.”
“Yes.”
The word hung in the room.
Shuaixi had been standing near the wall, listening without saying anything.
He looked from Zha to Xuan and then back to the map.
“Who?”
Xuan looked at Shuaixi.
The weakest fighter.
Zha was needed for the attack.
Lan, Jie, and the others had their own roles.
Shuaixi is the most expendable.
Losing Zha would leave them without their strongest fighter when the Xenomorphs were trapped.
Unacceptable.
“You,” Xuan said.
Shuaixi stared.
For a moment, the expression on his face was almost blank, as though he had not understood the word.
Then his face flushed.
“Me?”
“You are the most suitable.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Your physical ability is the lowest among us.”
Shuaixi pushed away from the wall.
“So because I’m weaker than everyone else, you want me to run around while those things chase me?”
“If you follow the route correctly, they will never reach you.”
Probability of contact remains significant.
“You don’t know that,” Shuaixi snapped.
“I know the route.”
“You don’t know what those things are going to do!” His voice had already risen.
Xuan watched him.
Fear.
Shuaixi understood the risk.
That was why he was resisting.
It changed nothing.
Zha stepped forward.
“No.”
Xuan looked at him.
“If someone has to do it, I’ll do it.”
“You are needed for the attack.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should.”
Zha glared at him.
“He’s one of us.”
Xuan said nothing.
Of course.
Zha would rather risk himself than send Shuaixi.
“You’re our strongest fighter,” Xuan said.
“Once the creatures are isolated, we need you to kill them. If you are the bait, we lose the person most capable of dealing with them.”
“I said I’ll do it.”
“And I said no.”
Zha’s eyes narrowed.
Shuaixi looked between them.
“Then what am I supposed to do?”
Xuan looked around the room.
Zha will vote against it.
That much was obvious.
Jie would likely follow Zha’s lead, or at least weigh the human cost.
The others?
Harder to predict.
Fear would influence some.
Survival instinct would influence others.
If I force the decision, Shuaixi may stop cooperating.
A reluctant bait was dangerous.
Let them choose.
“We vote,” Xuan said.
That stopped the argument.
Shuaixi stared at him.
“You’re letting them decide whether I die?”
“If the majority rejects the plan, we retreat.”
“And if they accept it?”
“We proceed.”
Zha looked around the room.
Nobody seemed comfortable with the choice.
They had spent the last several hours running from creatures that could tear a human body apart with little effort.
Now they were being asked to decide which member of their own group should deliberately place himself in front of them.
Zha raised his hand first, jaw tight.
“We fight.”
Jie followed him, his expression grim as he cast a heavy look toward the floor.
Lan hesitated for a beat before raising hers.
The others followed one by one, shifting uncomfortably and avoiding Shuaixi’s gaze entirely.
When it was over, Shuaixi stood completely still.
He looked down at his hands, then slowly raised his eyes toward the others.
“So that’s it.”
Nobody answered.
“You all agree.”
Zha opened his mouth, but Shuaixi shook his head.
“Don’t.” His voice was quieter now.
“You already tried.” He turned away from them.
The control room became busy as everyone prepared for the operation, but Shuaixi remained apart from them.
He knows.
Eventually, Shuaixi left the room.
The corridor outside was quiet.
For several seconds there was nothing on the monitors except empty metal passageways.
Then Shuaixi’s voice came through the communicator.
“I’m moving.”
Xuan watched the camera feed.
Shuaixi ran through the corridor as instructed, his footsteps echoing through the empty ship.
A Xenomorph appeared behind him.
Then another.
Then a third.
“They’re here!” Shuaixi’s voice cracked through the communicator.
“They’re behind me!”
“Keep running,” Xuan said.
“I know!”
The creatures gained on him.
Beside him, Zha had stopped pretending to be calm.
“How far?”
“Not yet.”
Shuaixi reached the intersection by the primary junction.
“Open the door!”
Xuan continued watching.
“Not yet.”
“Xuan!” Zha moved closer to the console.
“He’s almost there.”
Xuan could see Shuaixi on the monitor now.
He was running as hard as he could, his breathing loud enough to carry through the communicator.
One of the creatures was only a short distance behind him.
“Open it!”
“Wait.”
Shuaixi crossed the threshold of the designated section.
Xuan pressed the control.
The heavy bulkhead began to descend.
Shuaixi threw himself forward.
The door slammed down behind him.
The Xenomorphs struck the other side almost immediately.
Zha reached for the detonator.
“Now.”
The explosives went off.
The explosion shook the control room.
Dust fell from the ceiling as the monitors flickered, and the sound of collapsing metal rolled through the ship.
Nobody spoke.
Xuan waited for the cameras to recover.
The smoke slowly cleared.
The corridor was buried beneath broken metal, and dark blood spread across the floor.
Xuan changed the feed.
One body.
Another.
Another.
He counted again.
Three.
His eyes moved to the next monitor.
There should be four.
He switched cameras.
Nothing.
Another.
Still nothing.
Xuan’s expression did not change, but his attention sharpened.
Where did it go?
Lan leaned closer to the monitor.
“Are they dead?”
Then Xuan found the missing creature.
It was moving through a service corridor several decks away.
Alone.
Xuan watched it continue through the ship.
It had separated from the others before the bulkhead closed.
Why?
There was no human near it, and no obvious reason for the change in direction.
Xuan followed the creature through the next camera.
It disappeared around a corner.
He switched feeds.
There it was again, still moving deeper into the ship.
“Xuan?” Zha was looking at him.
“One escaped.”
Zha’s expression tightened.
“Can you track it?”
“Yes.”
Xuan kept his eyes on the screen until the creature disappeared again.
He noted the last location.
They had killed most of the creatures in the trap, but one remained somewhere inside the ship.
For now, that was enough.
He would deal with it when the rest of the operation was secure.
Several levels away, Six continued working through the information available from the Nostromo’s systems.
The tablet showed her structural plans, environmental readings, and camera feeds as she pieced together the ship’s layout.
“Alex,” Six’s voice cut through the comms.
“Talk to me.”
“One of the Xenomorphs broke away from the others. It’s three levels below you, moving toward the same section.”
Alexandra glanced down at the tablet again.
The Xenomorph was somewhere below them, moving through the same section of the ship they were heading toward.
Three thousand points.
Twice the reward as the penalty.
God really wanted Ripley alive.
Whatever happened if she failed, Alexandra had no intention of finding out.
“Keep its position updated,” she muttered, her grip tightening on the pistol.
“Let’s see what it wants.”
“Got it,” Six replied, pausing for a fraction of a second.
“Also, Alex, I found one of the women you helped earlier.”
Alexandra glanced back at the tablet screen.
“She’s alive?”
“Yes. She’s barricaded herself inside a maintenance bay.”
“And the other one?”
Six paused.
“I’ve not found her.”
Alexandra didn’t answer.
She kept moving, Ebony ready in her hand, while Six tracked the lone Xenomorph somewhere below them in the dark.