and-clear expedition here'
'We're talking thermonuclear explosion.'
That made Gorman sit back and think. He weighed his options. His decision was made easier by the fact that he didn't have any. 'Apone, collect rifle magazines from everybody. We can't have any firing in there.'
Apone wasn't the only one who overheard the order. The troopers eyed one another with a combination of disbelief and dismay.
'Is he crazy?' Wierzbowski clutched his rifle protectively to his ribs, as if daring Gorman to come down and disarm it personally.
Hudson all but growled. 'What're we supposed to use, man? Harsh language?' He spoke into his headset. 'Hey, Lieutenant you want maybe we should try judo? What if they ain't got any arms?'
'They've got arms,' Ripley assured him tightly.
'You're not going in naked, Hudson,' Gorman told him 'You've got other weapons you can use.'
'Maybe that wouldn't be such a bad idea,' Dietrich muttered.
'What, using alternates?' Wierzbowski muttered.
'No. Hudson going in naked. No living thing could stand the shock.'
'Screw you, Dietrich,' the comtech shot back.
'Not a chance.' With a sigh the medtech yanked the fully charged magazine from her rifle.
'Flame units only.' Gorman's tone was no-nonsense. 'I want all rifles slung.'
'You heard the lieutenant.' Apone began circulating among them, collecting magazines. 'Pull 'em out.'
One by one the rifles were rendered harmless. Vasquez turned over the power packs for her smartgun with great reluctance. Three of the troopers carried portable incinerator units in addition to their penetration weapons. These were unlimbered, warmed up, and checked. Unnoticed by Apone or any of her colleagues, Vasquez slipped a spare power cell from the back of her pants and slipped it into her smartgun. As soon as the sergeant's eyes and all suit cameras were off them, Drake did likewise. The two smartgun operators exchanged a grim wink.
Hicks had no one to wink at and no smartgun to jimmy with What he did have was a cylindrical sheath attached to the inner lining of his battle harness. Unzipping his torso armour, he opened the sheath to reveal the gunmetal-gray twin barrels of an antique pump twelve-gauge shotgun with a sawed-off butt stock. As Hudson looked on with professional interest the corporal resealed his armour, clicked back the stock of the well-maintained relic, and chambered a round.
'Where'd you get that, Hicks? When I saw that bulge, I thought you were smuggling liquor, except that'd be out of character for you. Steal it from a museum?'
'Been in my family for a long time. Cute, isn't it?'
'Some family. Can it do anything?'
Hicks showed him a single shell. 'Not your standard militaryissue high-velocity armour-piercing round, but you don't want it going off in your face, either.' He kept his voice down. 'I always keep this handy. For close encounters. I don't think it'l penetrate anything far enough to set off any mushrooms.'
'Yeah, real cute.' Hudson favoured the sawed-off with a last admiring look. 'You're a traditionalist, Hicks.'
The corporal smiled thinly. 'It's my tender nature.'
Apone's voice carried back to them from just ahead. 'Let's move. Hicks, since you seem to like it back there, you take rear guard.'
'My pleasure, Sarge.' The corporal rested the old shotgun against his right shoulder, balancing it easily with one hand, his finger light on the heavy trigger. Hudson grinned appreciatively, gave Hicks the high sign, and jogged forward to take up his assigned position near the point.
The air was thick, and their lights were diffused by the roiling steam. Hudson felt as though they were advancing through a steel-and-plastic jungle.
Gorman's voice echoed in his headset. 'Any movement?' The lieutenant sounded faint and far away, even though the comtech knew he was only a couple of levels above and just outside the entrance to the processing station. He kept his eyes on his tracker as he advanced.
'Hudson here, sir. Nothing so far. Zip. The only thing moving around down here is the air.'
He turned a corner and glanced up from the miniature readouts. What he saw made him forget the tracker, forget his rifle, forget everything.
Another encrusted wall lay directly in front of them. It was marred by bulges and ripples and had been sculpted by some unknown, inhuman hand, a teratogenic version of Rodin's Gates of Hell. Here were the missing colonists, entombed alive in the same epoxy-like resin that had been used to construct the latticework and tunnels, chambers and pits, and had transformed the lowest level of the processing station into something out of a xenopsychotic nightmare.
Each had been cocooned in the wall without regard for human comfort. Arms and legs had been grotesquely twisted broken when necessary in order to make the unfortunate victim fit properly into the alien scheme and design. Heads lolled at unnatural angles. Many of the bodies had been reduced to desiccated lumps of bone from which the flesh and skin had decayed. Others had been cleaned to the naked bone They were the fortunate ones who had been granted the gift o death. Every corpse had one thing in common, no matter where it was situated or how it had been placed in the wall: the rib cages had been bent outward, as though the sternum had exploded from behind.
The troopers moved slowly into the embryo chamber. Their expressions were grim. No one said anything. There wasn't one among them who hadn't laughed at death, but this was worse than death. This was obscene.
Dietrich approached the still-intact figure of a woman. The body was ghostly white, drained. The eyelids fluttered and opened as the woman sensed movement, a presence something. Madness dwelt within. The figure spoke in a hollow, sepulchral voice, a whisper conjured up out of desperation. Trying to hear, Dietrich leaned closer.
'Please—kill me.'
Wide-eyed, the medtech stumbled back. Within the safety of the APC Ripley could only stare helplessly, biting down hard on the knuckles of her left hand. She knew what was coming knew what prompted the woman's ultimate request, just as she knew that neither she nor anyone else could do anything except comply. The sound of somebody retching came over the Operations bay speakers. Nobody made jokes about that either.
The woman imprisoned in the wall began to convulse Somewhere she summoned up the energy to scream, a steady sawing shriek of mindless agony. Ripley took a step toward the nearest mike, wanting to warn the troopers of what was coming but unable to make her throat work.
It wasn't necessary. They'd studied the research disks she'd prepared for them.
'Flamethrower!' Apone snapped. 'Move!'
Frost handed his incinerator to the sergeant, stepped aside As Apone took possession, the woman's chest erupted in a spray of blood. From the cavity thus formed, a small fanged skull emerged, hissing viciously.
Apone's finger jerked the trigger of the flamethrower. The two other soldiers who carried similar devices imitated his action. Heat and light filled the chamber, searing the wall and obliterating the screaming horror it contained. Cocoons and their contents melted and ran like translucent taffy. A deafening screeching echoed in their ears as they worked the fire over the entire end of the room. What wasn't carbonized by the intense heat melted. The wall puddled and ran, pooling around their boots like molten plastic. But it didn't smell like plastic. It gave off a thick, organic stench.
Everyone in the chamber was intent on the wall and the flamethrowers. No one saw a section of another wall twitch.
VIII
The alien had been lying dormant, prone in a pocket that blended in perfectly with the rest of the room. Slowly it emerged from its resting niche. Smoke from burning cocoons and other organic matter billowed roofward, reducing visibility in the chamber to near zero.
