Alien

Ash.'

'No machine is perfect. They ought to be more flexible. We need a complete hospital in here, not just this little autodoc. It's not designed to cope with anything this. . well, this alien. The problem may be beyond its capability. Like any machine, it's only as effective as the information programmed into it. I just wish I knew more medicine.'

'This is also,' Ripley went on, 'the first time I've ever heard you express feelings of inadequacy.'

'If you know less than everything, you always feel inadequate. I don't see how you can feel otherwise.' He looked back down at Kane. 'That feeling is magnified when the universe confronts you with something utterly beyond your experience. I don't have the knowledge to cope properly, and it makes me feel helpless.'

Handling the forceps carefully, he lifted the alien by two of its fingers and transferred it to a large, transparent vial. He touched a control set into the vial's stopper, sealed the vial shut. A yellow glow filled the tube.

Ripley had watched the procedure intently. She half expected the creature to suddenly melt its way out of the stasis tube and come clutching for them all. Finally convinced that it could no longer threaten her, except in nightmares, she turned and headed for the infirmary exit.

'I don't know about the rest of you,' she said back over a shoulder, 'but I could do with some coffee.'

'Good thought.' Dallas glanced at Ash. 'You be okay in here by yourself?'

'You mean, alone with that?' He jerked a thumb in the direction of the sealed container, grinned. 'I'm a scientist. Things like that heighten my curiosity, not my pulse rate. I'll be fine, thanks. If anything develops or if Kane's condition shows hints of changing, I'll buzz you immediately.'

'Deal.' He looked back to the waiting Ripley. 'Let's go find that coffee.'

The infirmary door slid tightly shut behind them and they started back toward the bridge, leaving the autodoc to work on Kane, and Ash to work on the autodoc. .

VIII

The coffee soothed their stomachs if not their brains. Around them the Nostromo functioned smoothly, uninterested in the deceased alien stasised in the infirmary. Familiar hums and smells filled the bridge.

Dallas recognized some of the odours as issuing from various members of the crew. He took no offence at them, merely sniffed once or twice in recognition. Such fineries as deodorant were neither missed nor taken exception to on a ship the size of the Nostromo. Imprisoned in a metal bottle light-years from warm worlds and sanitized atmospheres, the crew's wakened minds were occupied by more important matters than the effluvia of one's neighbour.

Ripley looked troubled still.

''What's eating you? Still simmering over Ash's decision to open the lock and let us back in?'

Her voice was tight with frustration. 'How could you leave that kind of decision to him?'

'I told you,' he explained patiently. 'It was my decision to bring Kane in, not. . oh, you mean about keeping the corpse of the alien?'

She nodded. 'Yeah. It's too late to argue about the lock. I might've been wrong on that. But keeping that thing on board, dead or not, after what it's done to Kane.?

He tried to mollify her. 'We don't know for sure that it's done anything to Kane except knock him out. According to the readouts there's nothing else wrong with him.

'As to retaining it on board, I just run this ship. I'm only a pilot.'

'You're the captain.'

'A title of last resort, one that means nothing in specified situations. Parker can overrule me on a point of engineering. On anything that has to do with the science division, Ash has the final word.'

'And how does that happen?' She sounded more curious than bitter, now.

'Same way that everything else happens. On orders from the Company. Read your own directory.'

'Since when is it standard procedure?'

He was getting a touch exasperated. 'Come on, Ripley. This isn't a military vessel. You know as well as I that standard procedure is what they tell you to do. That principle includes the independence of different departments, like science. If I believed otherwise, I'm not sure I would've set down here.'

'What's the matter? Visions of discovery bonuses fading before the specter of a dead man?'

'You know better than that,' he said sharply. 'There isn't a bonus large enough to trade for Kane's good health. Too late for that, now. We're here, and it's happened.

'Look, ease up on me, will you? I just haul cargo for a living. If I wanted to be a real explorer and go gallivanting off after discovery bonuses I would've joined the Rim Corps. Gotten my head torn off at least half a dozen times by now. Glory. . no thanks. Not for me. I'll settle for having my executive officer back again.'

She didn't reply this time, sat silently for several minutes. When she spoke the next time, the bitterness was gone. 'You and Kane been together on many flights?'

'Enough to know each other.' Dallas kept his voice level, eyes on his console.

'What about Ash?'

'You going to start in on that again?' He sighed. There was nowhere to run. 'What about him?'

'Same thing. You say you know Kane. Do you know Ash? Have you ever shipped with him before?'

'No.' The thought didn't bother Dallas in the least. 'This is the first time. I went five hauls, long and short, various cargos, with another science officer. Then two days before we left Thedus, they replaced him with Ash.'

She stared at him significantly.

'So what?' he snapped at her. 'They also replaced my old warrant officer with you.'

'I don't trust him.'

'Sound attitude. Now me. . I don't trust anyone.' Time, he thought, to change the subject. From what he'd seen so far, Ash was a fine officer, if a bit stiff when it came to being one of the gang. But personal intimacy wasn't a necessity on voyages where you spent most of your time except arriving and departing in the narcosis of hypersleep. As long as the man did his job, Dallas didn't give a damn about his personality. Thus far, there'd been no reason to question Ash's competency.

'What's holding up repairs?' he asked her.

She glanced at her chronometre, did some quick figuring. 'They ought to be pretty much finished by now. Shouldn't have to do more than fine-check.'

'Why didn't you say so?'

'There are still some things left to do, I'm sure, or they would've said something. Listen, you think I'm stalling for Parker, of all people?'

'No. What's left to do?'

She ran a fast request through her board. 'We're still blind on B and C decks. Scanners blew and need to be completely replaced there.'

'I don't give a damn about seeing B and C decks. I know what they look like. Anything else?'

'Reserve power systems blew just after we touched down. Remember the trouble with the secondaries?'

'But the main drivers are fixed?' She nodded. 'Then that stuff about the reserves is crap. We can take off without them, get back into hypersleep, and do some real travelling instead of hanging around here.'

'Is that a good idea? About taking off without having the secondaries fixed, I mean.'

'Maybe not. But I want out of here, and I want out now. We've investigated that signal all we're going to and there's nobody here to rescue except Kane. Let some properly equipped Company expedition set down and go digging around that derelict. That's not what we're paid for. We've complied with the directives. Now I've had enough. Let's get this turkey off the ground.'

They settled into their roles on the bridge. Kane and the dead alien were forgotten. Everything was forgotten, except take-off procedure. They were a unit now. Personal animosities and opinions were submerged in the desire to get the tug off the ground and back into clean, open space.