Alien: Covenant - The Official Movie Novelization

XVII

The line of precise hash marks inscribed in the corridor seemed endless. Her fingertips dancing along the wall, Rosenthal’s hand rose and fell, rose and fell as she traced the marks, letting them lead her onward. Lost in her own exploratory reverie, it did not occur to her that she had left the domed chamber a considerable distance behind.

Something off to her right made her halt. It was familiar, almost welcoming. Hefting her rifle she followed it as it grew steadily louder. The sound of running water never became a roar, never rose above a trickle, even when she entered a new chamber whose ceiling was so high she could barely make it out in the filtered light.

Entering, she turned a slow circle as she walked, marveling at the vertical garden that filled the high room, growing up the walls. Or more likely growing down them, she corrected herself. After nothing to eat for many hours save packaged emergency rations, the presence of several kinds of fresh fruit, their multi-hued surfaces glistening with droplets, was tempting. Having seen far too much of what this planet held in the way of surprises, she didn’t go near them. They might contain nothing more threatening than pulp and seeds, she told herself, but she wasn’t in the mood to experiment. Not with anything living, she mused.

Water, however, was another matter.

Setting her rifle aside where it wouldn’t get wet, she approached the nearest singing cascade. Extending a palm, she let the clear liquid flow over it and down the sides of her hand. It was cool, almost refreshingly cold. Did it come from the same source as the central well? If so, then it should be safe to drink. If it was only collected rainwater, even better. After an additional moment of hesitation she cupped both hands, let them fill, then brought the cupful to her mouth and drank. Insofar as she could tell, it was nothing more than it appeared to be.

Leaning into the flow, she let the cold cascade drizzle down over her face. It was more than refreshing. It was rejuvenating. Smiling, she rolled up her sleeve and extended the arm that had been injured in the fight with the neomorphs. Using her other hand, she brushed and rubbed the fresh water over the wound. It was almost as if she could feel the damaged skin healing.

Something that was not running water made a noise.

Blinking away a few lingering droplets, she turned. At first she wasn’t sure what she was looking at, even though it was quite near. Dimly illuminated by the intermittent light, it was almost too pale for details to quickly resolve. As her vision cleared she made out a curving, intelligent forehead, white, with water dribbling onto it and down.

She recognized the neomorph.

Her eyes flicked to where she had set down her rifle. It was very close, almost at hand. She lunged.

Grabbing her face and head, the creature lifted her off the ground. Despite the pain in her neck, she clutched at the ossified arm and struggled to pull free. Effortlessly, the neomorph flung her across the room.

Blood sprayed as she slammed awkwardly against a wall. Something snapped, sending through her a bolt of excruciating pain. Unable to move, her back broken, she could only look on, her expression a mixture of fury and fear, as it came toward her.

The almost human, tooth-laden mouth opened wide.

A noise as of something hitting the ground caused David to pause and turn. After ten years he knew every sound, every slight squeak and scratch, inside the massive structure. Now this, something new. It came from what he had come to call the Drizzle Room. An immature label, perhaps, but one that appealed to his sense of whimsy.

Approaching the access portal with his customary caution, he peered in and let out a sibilant gasp.

Tail switching back and forth, the neomorph had its back toward him. It was hunched over something that was ravaged and broken. From the little that was visible, David recognized the limp body of a member of the landing party’s security team. Further scanning with his exceptional vision, he identified the body as belonging to the team member named Rosenthal. He eyed it only long enough to identify it. His attention, like his real interest, was focused on the neomorph.

It rose and turned slowly in his direction.

He started to retrace his steps. Not running, but retreating with deliberation down the access corridor. Around a turn and down in another direction before he finally stopped and turned to face that which could not be escaped.

Advancing with a gait somewhere between a fast walk and a deliberate trot, it came toward him. When he didn’t move, it halted only inches from his face. In the weakly illuminated hallway, synthetic and neomorph stood facing each other. David remained stock still, not moving a muscle. The creature was equally immobile.

Appearing around the previous corner, Oram raised the carbine he was carrying. A quick tap ensured that the full magazine was properly seated. David saw him out of the corner of his eye.

“Don’t shoot, don’t shoot!” the synthetic implored him. Only his lips moved, only his synthetic respiratory system impacted his immediate surroundings.

The creature was likewise exhaling, its fetid breath ruffling the front of the synthetic’s hair. It studied the biped standing motionless before it, the elongated, pointed head tilting slightly to one side. What it was thinking—if it was thinking, in the accepted sense—could only be imagined.

Raising the muzzle of the carbine, Oram stood and regarded the stationary confrontation. It was like being in a cage with a raptor and its potential victim. One wrong movement… one wrong sound, and immobility would be replaced by bedlam.

The neomorph opened its jaws wide. Wider still, its gaping maw right in front of David’s face. He didn’t blink, didn’t flinch. With near mechanical precision, the jaws closed. It stood there, gazing inquisitively at a quarry that refused to flee.

With great care and deliberation, David pursed his lips and blew gently into the horror of a countenance.

As it received the exhalation the neomorph’s head drew back, paused, then moved in close once again. There was no sign of confusion in its movements. Only a barely perceived hesitancy. The synthetic blew a second time. Once again the smooth skull eased back. The creature appeared almost—calm.

A slow smile spread across David’s face. His excitement was palpable. It was as if he had, somehow, placed the murderous apparition under a kind of hypnosis. Conscious of Oram’s continued presence, the synthetic addressed him without shifting his gaze from the killing machine standing before him.

“Communication, Captain,” he said, his voice filling the silence. “In the end, communication is everything. It is communication that leads to understanding. Breathe on the nostrils of a horse and he’ll be yours for life—if he doesn’t trample you first. Once your presence, your audacious proximity, is accepted, the beginnings of mutual comprehension ensue. But you have to get close. You have to earn its trust. It’s a universal accommodation.” He leaned forward to blow a third time into the creature’s face.

Oram fired.

The neomorph jerked back, its blood spurting. The panic and dismay that distorted David’s face were unlike any expression the captain had seen on the synthetic’s face since their arrival. His normally composed, always level voice became an aberrant shriek.

“No!”

Ignoring him, a grim-faced Oram kept firing as he advanced. Though not a member of Covenant Security, he was a very good shot and at this range did not, could not, miss. As each blast struck home, the neomorph twisted and jerked violently. Its contortions were accompanied by a continuous, long howl from David.

“No! Nooooo…”

Paying no attention to the synthetic’s pleas and oblivious to anything other than his target, Oram continued firing as he moved forward. Forced backward by the continual, relentless barrage, the neomorph sought to escape. Each time it tried to rush past him or turn, the captain put another shell into it. Eventually trapping it in a corner, Oram slapped another magazine into the carbine and continued to fire, heedless of whatever the creature might do.

One final shot and it ceased writhing, a mass of quivering, bloody flesh and exoskeleton that lay unmoving on the smooth pavement underfoot. Oram would have kept shooting, but he needed his remaining ammunition for another task.

Completely out of control as well as out of character, David stared at the bleeding, oozing body in disbelief. Then, his eyes blazing with hatred, he turned and took a step toward the captain.

“How could you do that? It trusted me!”

Wordlessly, his expression set, Oram calmly raised the carbine and aimed the muzzle directly between David’s eyes.

Fighting to regain control of himself, the synthetic halted. His familiar smile returned and he mustered a weak laugh.

“Gorgeous specimen. A real shame.”

Oram’s hands were as steady as a ship in space. The muzzle loomed very large in David’s vision.

“Tell me what’s going on here.”

The synthetic feigned ignorance. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You know exactly what I mean. Your programming allows for many variables, but not confusion. I met the Devil when I was a child, and I have never forgotten him. Now you will tell me the truth, of everything that has happened here, after you arrived here, and since you have been here. Or I will seriously fuck up your perfect composure and you will not have to worry about the future condition of your coiffure.” His gaze was cold, cold.

Silently sizing up the situation, David knew the captain was not bluffing. One wrong word, one wrong movement from him, and the result would be a cessation of consciousness.

He contemplated rushing the human, but in light of how ruthlessly and efficiently Oram had brought down the magnificent neomorph, the synthetic calculated his odds of avoiding destruction, or at least serious damage to his systems, were no better than fifty-fifty.

“As you like.” He ventured a crooked grin. “I live to serve. Come with me—Captain.” He turned and gestured down the corridor. “Enlightenment lies this way.” He stepped away, and Oram followed wordlessly.

The gray-toned organically inspired hallways through which they strode were all new to the captain. They had not been this way, had not encountered any of these viscera-like passages, since their arrival at the cathedral. The illumination was darker than elsewhere, feeble at best.

Taking no chances, he maintained a safe distance between himself and his guide. The muzzle of his weapon never left the back of David’s head. If the synthetic was aware of the constant threat, he gave no indication that it troubled him. Leading the way, he did not once turn or look back. Oram could have pulled the trigger at any time. But before he made that decision, he wanted explanations. David seemed not just willing now, but even eager to provide them.

Eventually they paused before a door. Like those closing off similar portals within the structure, it was much taller and wider than necessary to admit a human. There was nothing intentionally grandiose about its dimensions. It was simply sized to permit the passage of the typical Engineer.

Beside the door, set into the wall, was the prominent hemispherical bulge of a control not unlike those that dominated the console of the pilot’s chair in the ship’s navigation room. When David traced a pattern over it, the slightly translucent surface came to life. He spoke calmly as the barrier before them began to draw aside.

“You don’t think much of synthetics, do you?”

Oram wasn’t about to be baited. Not now, in this place. He kept his eyes and the carbine focused.

“I like a machine that does its job and doesn’t talk back,” he said. “I like one that follows instructions and doesn’t offer suggestions unless they’re requested. What I want in a machine is the equivalent of a smart hammer—not a smart ass.”

“You speak for your species. How typical. Contempt for anything unlike yourself. Disdain for anything non-human, even if in some small way it might represent an improvement. Does it not strike you as ironic that humans, who consider themselves the shining lights of the firmament, spend so much of their lives—both individual and social—fighting with one another? You even resent many of the times when circumstances force you to cooperate, when you should be celebrating such efforts. A few of you recognize the inherent contradictions, yet do nothing to resolve them.”

The portal before them now stood fully open.

“But enough philosophizing, which you freely indicate you despise in any being other than yourselves. As a scientist, at least, I know you’ll find what I am about to show you of considerable interest. Even revolutionary. All you have to do is open your mind a little.”

As they entered a dark chamber, light appeared from unseen sources, responding to their presence. Oram immediately recognized the sizeable room as a study or laboratory of some sort.

Perhaps both, he thought warily. The architecture and construction marked it as an older part of the massive building, more like a catacomb than an oft-used area. It was immaculately neat. He was not surprised by that. Not with the synthetic having ten years in which to organize its contents. Wall-climbing shelves were filled with a decade’s worth of scavenging. Despite himself Oram was amazed at the range of material David had managed to accumulate, all of it appearing to have been collected from the surrounding city.

Still, it was apparent that not all of the artifacts were locally sourced. There were bits and pieces that reflected David’s own myriad talents, from sculpture to scribing, from abstract to realistic art. On a huge table that dominated the center of the room, Oram saw what was either a thin slice of highly polished wood or a thick piece of hand-made paper. Given ten years in which to practice, David easily could have mastered the paper-making skill. And as represented by the nearby forest, there was an ample supply of raw material.

On the paper, if such it was, an intricate grid had been marked out. In the center of each grid square a specimen had been pinned or otherwise fastened down. Some examples were intact, some partial, some fully dissected. It was all very orderly and clinical, exactly the sort of display one could expect to find in the private lab of a wealthy dilettante back home.

Laid out before him, then, was David’s own “Cabinet of Curiosities.” Or perhaps the synthetic regarded it as more of a trophy chamber. In either case, there was an undeniable hint of pride in his voice as he indicated the well-maintained display.

“As you can see, I’ve become a bit of an amateur zoologist over the years. Just a dabbler, mind you. I tried adding botany to my resume, but I quickly became too consumed with studying the minimal surviving fauna, and could not spare the time. Even with, as you might think, ten years to spare.”

Carbine still held at the ready, Oram followed him around the room. Full of objects propped against the walls, laid out on other smaller tables, or mounted vertically, the chamber was a cavern of wonders. Even the captain was not immune to its bizarre attractions.

His eyes were drawn to the giant figure of a single Engineer, laid out on a table. With surgical precision the body had been stripped of its outer layer of fat, skin, and muscle, leaving behind only an orderly superstructure of tendons, sinews, and bone as neat as a city transport grid.

David noted Oram’s awe, even though the muzzle of the weapon the captain held was still aimed in his direction.

“As you can see, my time here hasn’t been wasted. It’s in my nature to keep busy. Keep the mind exercised and all that, lest it fall prey to disorder from disuse.” He indicated the massive body of the Engineer. “This specimen was particularly arduous to complete—and messy. You can imagine. Fortunately, with thousands of examples from which to choose, I was able to practice on as many as I wished before finally getting this one right.” He smiled amiably, as if he was discussing the prep work needed to create a particularly elaborate gourmet dinner.

At the head of another long but less massive table than the one in the center of the room, he pointed out a rack containing several clear ampoules of exotic design. Each was filled with a black liquid, and appeared to be tightly sealed.

“The original virus, salvaged from the ship I arrived on. Despite their apparent fragility, the containers are far from ordinary glass, and are very sturdily made. A fact for which, I am sure you can imagine, I was very grateful. Not for my own sake, but for Elizabeth’s.”

Leaning close for a better look, Oram found that he was intrigued despite himself. The contents of the room were fascinating, from the specimen-laden table in the center to this, simple bottles containing an innocuous fluid full of ominous portent.

As they continued to circle the room David enthusiastically pointed out other highlights and examples of his work. Eventually he returned his attention to the center table.

“The pathogen took many forms, and proved extremely mutable,” he explained. “Fiendishly inventive, in fact. The speed of its mutability is one of its defining characteristics, and makes it such an effective weapon. How do you design a defense against something that is capable of constant change, in response to its surroundings? How could your body’s own immune system possibly defend itself?

“A genetically engineered counter-virus, for example, or a human body’s own white blood cells, would immediately be met by the pathogen adapting itself,” he continued, “to counter the counter, and so on. As a weapon or a method of biological cleansing, it is simply impossible to defend against.” Turning, he pointed across the room to the ampoules of black fluid.

“The original liquid atomizes to particles when exposed to the air. It then reproduces in whatever host it happens upon, and eventually gives rise to more liquid, which at the appropriate time atomizes, and so on and so on, the cycle repeating itself almost endlessly.”

“‘Almost’?” Oram put in.

David smiled again. “Until there are no more hosts. Ten years on, all that remains outside of the original, untapped containers of virus are these gorgeous little beasts.”

Reaching onto the table, he picked up what looked like black mold contained within a paper-thin membrane—and playfully tossed it to Oram. Instinctively, the captain caught it. Realizing what he’d done, he froze.

Nothing happened.

Walking over to him, David ignored the gun as he took the stone-hard egg sac from the momentarily petrified Oram.

“Don’t worry. It’s fully ossified now. Completely inert and harmless. I keep them around only for my amusement. Just another part of the collection.” Carefully, he turned and set the sac back in its place.

Further down the table stood a row of mounted magnifying lenses. They were sufficiently universal in design and purpose that the captain was unable to decide if they were the product of Engineer fabrication, or if David had made them himself. Behind each one was a cluster of tiny black motes preserved in something that looked like amber. David gestured. Hesitant at first, Oram finally gave in to curiosity and leaned toward one lens for a closer look.

“Like all good naturalists,” David continued, “I observed the fecundity of life at work. When engaged in such study, patience is everything. Patience and time. I am naturally imbued with the former, and circumstance has provided me—however unwillingly—with plenty of the latter. From the egg sacs came these parasites. Airborne and gifted with a very primitive but dutiful hive intelligence, once released into the atmosphere they are relentless in their purpose. The shock troops of a genetic assault, always searching for a potential host.”

Within the tinted but otherwise transparent material, the captain could see frozen in place various stages of the pathogen’s life cycle. Motes inserting feeding tubes into insect-sized subjects and pumping eggs into their unfortunate bodies. The eggs growing, hatching, and maturing, to finally burst free even from the diminutive hosts, only to begin the cycle again.

David led Oram to another corner of the room.

“Entering the host and rewriting the DNA, the pathogen produces mature offspring whose appearance and characteristics are wholly dependent on the nature of the host itself. The progeny of a parasitized insect, for example, will look very different from the creature that issues from a quadruped host. The ultimate aim, as I gather it, was to produce something like these enviable unions… my beautiful bestiary…”

Oram found himself filing past a row of tall, menacing bipeds. Their tough exoskeletons gleamed like black steel. Though there were slight individual variations, all had in common the same threatening aspect—long tails ending in scorpion-like points, curving elongated skulls devoid of visible eyes, and jaws filled with teeth shining like chromed chisels.

Further down the row of mounted specimens were less successful variants. Smaller, pale and white, ghastly and deformed. From the perfect to the demented, the stuff of nightmares, Oram mused. Some were intact while others had been partially or wholly dissected, not unlike the erect, skinned corpse of the Engineer. As he led the way down the line, David let his fingers trail gently, almost lovingly, across the mounted bodies.

“Marooned here so lamentably,” he explained, “I had nothing but time to watch and to learn. Eventually my innate curiosity got the better of me and, with nothing to occupy myself other than the compiling of a simple collection, I began to do a bit of genetic experimentation of my own. Some cross-breeding, hybridizing, what have you. I like to think that the ill-fated inhabitants of this world—the original Engineers—would gaze on my work with approval.”

His words were useful in reminding Oram to tighten his grip on the weapon he held.

“You… engineered these?”

David smiled anew. “Idle hands are the devil’s workshop.”

Oram stared at the line of specimens. It wasn’t endless, but it denoted a vast investment in time and energy. He couldn’t escape the feeling that there was much more at work here than the simple desire to avoid boredom.

“So much effort expended,” he said. “To what end? Why?”

“It’s not all that complicated. Cut off here, without a single living creature for company, I could remain in complete silence and isolation until the last of my systems eventually ran down and I—died. Or as you doubtless would prefer to say, ‘stopped.’ On the other hand, I could engage my mind and body in a long-term project designed to keep everything functioning at as high a level as possible. That is, after all, what my own engineers intended. So I occupy myself with the only viable toys that are available to me.”

Turning, he met the captain’s gaze directly.

“Haven’t you ever wanted to play God? As I understand it, this is a common fantasy among humans, and as long as weapons are not involved, it’s not a harmful one. In order to play God, however, one must have subjects. I have only what this planet has provided. What exists on this world, and what I was able to salvage from the crashed Engineer ship. I think, on balance, that I have done quite well with very little material.” He gestured toward the end of the table.

A sizable leathery egg shape sat there. It was separate from all the other specimens, as if occupying a place of honor.

Unsettled but confident in the rapid-fire carbine he held, Oram watched as the synthetic carefully opened the object, peeling back the top like the petals of a flower. Or a father pulling the edges of a blanket back from the face of a newborn.

“This one was a true survivor. Not unlike myself, I suppose, although my survival stems from intelligence, and its from inherent instinct. It can evolve and reproduce very quickly under a wide variety of situations.” His expression fell. “Sadly, it became aggressive, so I had to euthanize it. Such a shame. I place no blame on something with motivations that are purely primal.”

He beckoned. “Come and look.” When Oram, sensibly, hesitated, David smiled again. “Really, Captain, if I had wanted to infect you with something, I could have thrown you a viable egg sac, instead of a petrified one. Please, come and look. I guarantee your fascination.”

Challenged but still wary, Oram came forward. Gripping his rifle even more tightly and prepared to raise it at the slightest untoward movement from either the object or the synthetic, he leaned over to peer into the now gaping vase-like specimen. The interior revealed a motionless creature, all finger-like appendages and flattened body, with a muscular tail coiled beneath it as if it was ready to spring outward.

It did not move.

It was dead, as dead and preserved as David had promised. As dead as the egg sac the synthetic had tossed to him. Oram stepped back from the specimen, which seemed pregnant with hideous potential.

The synthetic’s reaction was notably different. “Quite magnificent, don’t you think?”

“Quite something, that’s for sure,” Oram muttered. He continued to gaze at the egg-thing and its contents. As patently lifeless as it was, it still managed to send a quiver of fear through him.

“Oh, Captain.” David shook his head sadly. “Acknowledge beauty when you see it. Even if its appearance disturbs you, surely you can admire the skill that went into its design. In case you are wondering, I had nothing to do with it. It lies as I found it, a supreme example of the Engineers’ skill. And also, I suppose, of their hubris.

“Would that I could create something so perfect in its function,” he added. “I try, but I don’t have thousands of years of practice at biological and genetic engineering. I have only my pitiable programming on which to draw. That, and ten years of earnest effort on my own behalf. I have learned only a little, yet I soldier on, hoping always to achieve something like this, always striving to do better, to improve. That’s what the Engineers did, I suppose. That is what someone playing God should do.”

He gestured toward a stairway leading downward.

“Come, this is really what I wanted to show you. My successes. For without an audience, how can one truly know if one has achieved success?” Leading the way toward the staircase, he paused to scoop up some ointment from an open pot, then turned and extended his smeared fingers toward Oram.

“May I?” When Oram shook his head no, the synthetic shrugged. “The smell below can be quite overpowering. And this can protect you from—other things. Here. Use it or not, as you see fit. It’s much like lavender.”

After depositing a dollop of the ointment on the tip of two of the captain’s fingers, David turned and entered the stairway. Oram examined the unguent closely. It showed no sign of movement. Nothing sprang from its interior to confront him. It was, to all appearances and feel, exactly what the synthetic had said it was.

Once again Oram was put in mind of what David could have done at any time while showing his visitor around the laboratory. So the ointment was probably harmless and maybe, as his host claimed, even useful. Maybe. It lay cool and damp against his fingertips.

For now, he would hold off doing anything with it.

Redolent of concentrated ammonia, the stench rose to meet him before they were halfway down the stairs. He recoiled. Hesitantly, he lifted his greasy fingertips toward his nose. The aroma was indeed like lavender. Taking a deep breath, he smeared the salve under his nostrils. Immediately, the acrid odor was neutralized. Feeling much better, he continued following his prideful guide.

The vapor that rose from the floor of the dark, windowless chamber beneath the laboratory might well have been pure ammonia. If so, however, he couldn’t detect it—the ointment worked wonderfully well. A side benefit to its neutralization of the stink was a general feeling of well-being. This was most welcome, since the underground room they now entered quite likely would have smelled of dead, rotting flesh. Water condensed on the enclosing walls. The ground underfoot was sodden, almost spongy.

Resting upright on the floor, neatly spaced from one another, were half a dozen leathery ovoids of varying sizes similar to the petrified specimen David had shown him above. The synthetic walked among them, occasionally running a hand over a curving, wrinkled exterior.

“And thus you see the end of my experiments. Though I marshaled ideas aplenty, I could go no further. No more subjects. No way to finish my masterpiece.”

Oram frowned. “What kind of subjects?”

David replied without looking in his direction. “Fauna.”

Oram moved up alongside him. “Are they alive?” he asked. “I don’t see anything to suggest it.”

“Oh, yes.” David’s enthusiasm was genuine. “Very much so. Waiting, really.”

“Waiting for what?”

The synthetic looked thoughtful. “I suppose you’d say, waiting for Mother.”

There was a flicker of motion from the egg-shape nearest Oram, and it caused him to draw back. The upper portion opened, the petals folding back to drip shimmering tendrils of saliva-like mucus down the sides and onto the absorbent floor. Giving a doleful shake of his head at the captain’s alarm, David approached the open ovoid and peered inside, his head almost touching the nearest petal.

“See? Alive, but inert. It’s not matured, not developed enough to sense me. Perfectly safe, I assure you.”

“I’m not surprised it doesn’t sense you.” Despite his growing curiosity, Oram maintained his distance. “You’re not organic.”

“Very true. That’s another thing the ointment is for. Much as it blockades the odor down here, it likewise blocks any indication of your living presence.” He gestured toward the interior of the egg-thing. “Take a look. You know you want to. A quick glance. In this state, it’s identical to the preserved one you saw above.”

Moving slowly and with great deliberation, Oram approached the ovoid. David stepped back, giving him room. This allowed the captain to aim his weapon in front of him, at the egg’s interior. Just in case, he told himself, even as he continued to glance frequently in the synthetic’s direction.

Then he peered down.

Beneath a tissue-thin membrane, something moved ever so slightly. Unable to make out the details, he started to step back. As he did so, the egg’s innards exploded in his face.

He didn’t even have time to scream.

The constrictor-like tail whipped around his neck as a clutch of bony appendages slapped across his face, locking tight around his head. As he staggered backward, stunned, he got off one shot in David’s direction. The synthetic didn’t even twitch as the blast went wild, damaging only the ceiling.

Suffocating under the pressure of the creature and its eight legs, Oram stumbled, nearly tripping over another egg. His mouth opened to yell, or curse, or shriek. It was impossible to divine his intent, because as soon as his lips parted, the ovipositor-like tube slammed down his throat and into his guts.

Dropping the carbine he fell to his knees and used his hands to claw futilely at the facehugger. His body began to spasm. His desperate, tormented efforts to get the horror off his face amounted to nothing. Collapsing to the floor, he continued to jerk and heave spasmodically.

Looking on with a clinical eye, David observed the process in silence, until something spilled out of one of the man’s pockets to roll across the floor. A metal worry bead.

Extending a leg, the synthetic stopped it with a toe and spoke quietly.

“You’re relieved of duty, Captain.”