In the Hieroglyphics Chamber
Lex watched through the peephole as the Predator who had just bloodied himself now gutted and dressed its kill in the adjacent chamber. The thunderbolt he had seared onto his own forehead had not only earned him his warrior status but it had also earned him the name “Scar” to the sole humans who had witnessed the events—Lex and Sebastian.
Using its ceremonial knife, Scar stripped the black, rubbery flesh away from the Alien’s jaw and severed the tissue holding the monster’s inner mouth in place. Then the Predator doused its trophy with a liquid solution that neutralized the Alien’s acidic blood. When the task was completed, Scar lay the grisly relic aside and suited up for battle.
For a moment, the creature vanished from sight. Lex pressed her face closer to the peephole, straining to see it. Suddenly, the Predator reappeared—staring through the very peephole she was using. The monster’s sharklike eyes were only inches from her own.
Lex gasped and jumped backwards. After a second or two, she regained her courage and peeked again.
The creature was ready to return to the hunt. It had reattached its metal faceplate, covering its still-seeping, self-inflicted brand of honor. Despite the gloom in the adjacent chamber, Lex could clearly see the same thunderbolt design etched into the creature’s metal mask.
Armor donned, the Predator hefted its spear, draped the trophy around its neck, and moved to the stone slab that separated the chamber of the pillars from the room the humans now occupied.
“He’s out there. Waiting for the door to open,” Lex whispered as she quickly slid on her backpack. At that moment, Sebastian realized they had another pack with them. The one Weyland had carried—the one that contained the Predators’ weapons.
“I think when we took the guns, we upset the order of how things work down here. We tipped the scales.”
Lex retrieved the pack. “He needs his guns back.”
Sebastian glanced at his watch, then shook his head. Time was running out. “When that door opens we’re dead.”
“Not if we set things right.”
Sebastian was astonished. “You can’t be serious.”
“This pyramid. It’s like a prison. We took the guards’ guns and now the prisoners are running free. To restore order, the guards need their guns.”
Sebastian shivered. “Don’t ever use that metaphor again.”
“When the door opens, we’re going to give that thing his gun back.”
“Are you crazy?” Sebastian cried. “You want a metaphor? During a big game hunt, the animals being hunted don’t arm the hunters.”
“They’re not hunting us. We’re in the middle of a war. It’s time to pick a side.”
“We’re on a side. Our side.”
“We have to consider the possibility that we might not make it out of here,” said Lex. “But we have to make sure that those serpents don’t reach the surface, because if they do, everything, everywhere could die.”
Sebastian was quiet for a moment. Then he nodded. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
Lex nodded too. “Look. We give him his guns, and if he leaves us alone we can get out of here. All we have to do is hold it together and make it to the surface.”
Sebastian’s watch alarm rang out. Next came the sound of rolling thunder and scraping rock as the pyramid began to reconfigure itself.
“Let’s go find our friend,” Lex commanded.
Sebastian took her arm as they both faced the door. The rumbling continued, but the portal did not budge.
“What happens if this door doesn’t open?”
Lex frowned. “Try to think positively.”
Just then, the stone slab behind them lifted into the ceiling. Sebastian looked over his shoulder. A door on their left had opened too. Beyond it they saw a shambling shape moving through the darkness toward them. It was not humanoid.
“Come on,” Sebastian urged. “We have to get out of here.”
The two ran into the empty corridor, once again lost in the maze of stone. As the pyramid continued to rumble, the walls shed layers upon layers of blinding dust.
Sebastian, who was in the lead, rounded a corner and spied the deep chasm that had opened up in front of them. The pit seemed to be close to a dozen feet across.
Even running at top speed the leap seemed impossible, but they had no choice.
“Get ready to jump!” Sebastian cried.
Without hesitation he hurled himself forward, arms outstretched.
As he arced through the empty air, Sebastian realized how impossible a jump it was—yet he almost made it. Almost.
The breath exploded from his lungs as he slammed into the far ledge. The impact shattered ribs, but he fought back the stabbing pain and clung to the edge nevertheless. His fingernails dug into the joints between the flagstones as he fought to gain a purchase.
Lex struck the wall a moment later, but much lower than Sebastian—so low that her fingers were not able to reach the ledge. Gloves scraping along the rock, Lex slid down the wall, poised to fall at any moment.
With one hand, Sebastian reached out and caught Lex. It was a harsh jerk that stopped her fall. More pain exploded in his chest, but Sebastian refused to let go. Groaning, his fingers dug into Lex’s sleeve and clamped tight. Lex twisted and dangled precariously over the dark abyss.
Hanging there, neither human noticed Scar approach from the opposite side of the chasm. It squatted on its haunches, observing their struggles. Activating its thermal vision, the Predator focused on the woman’s back. Inside of the backpack the plasma gun Lex carried was clearly visible.
Gasping from his Herculean efforts, Sebastian managed to throw one leg over the ledge. He then endeavored to pull both himself and Lex to safety. As sweat poured down his face and burned his eyes, he heard a scrabbling sound—like a hard-shelled crab crossing a rocky beach. He turned to see an Alien face hugger, its barbed appendages clinging to the sheer side of the ledge, closer to Lex than to him.
Sebastian shouted out a warning.
Another face hugger scuttled out from an opening in the rock wall, its tail lashing, slapping at Sebastian’s arm.
“Hang on!” he cried, trying to keep away from the hugger while dragging Lex to safety at the same time.
Looking down at her, Sebastian noticed movement in the shadows. Behind Lex, yet another face hugger was scaling the wall, its tail reaching out to fondle the tip of her boot.
Sebastian lashed out with his fist to smash the spidery horror tittering near his head. Knocked from its perch, the face hugger emitted a shrill shriek as it plunged helplessly into the abyss.
Only two face-hugging monsters remained. One scrabbled up the wall, its tail slapping Sebastian’s cheek as it passed. He nearly slipped from the ledge, but he caught himself just in time. Sebastian’s jerky movement came close to dislodging Lex as well.
The face hugger hissed at Sebastian, and suddenly a long, serpentlike appendage reached out of the creature’s belly and probed for an opening in Sebastian’s face. He raised his arm and slammed his elbow down on it.
Stunned, the face hugger plunged over the edge and into the pit.
Sebastian rolled onto the ledge, arms aching. He looked over to see the hugger scaling the wall parallel to Lex. Before he could warn her, Lex kicked the obscenity with all her might. Legs flailing helplessly, the creature tumbled end over end into the chasm.
“Hang on!” Sebastian cried, still clutching Lex’s hand.
As he pulled her toward the edge, Sebastian looked into her upturned face. Her eyes went wide as a shadow loomed over his shoulder.
“What?” he asked, turning.
Sebastian choked. With a look of stunned surprise, his arms flung back and he was ripped away from the ledge. Lex heard struggling, then a crash. She peered over the edge in time to see Sebastian yanked off his feet by a black, bestial figure. With a whipping sound its segmented tail lashed around Sebastian’s leg. Whether he was unconscious or dead was unclear, but the man w
as as limp as a rag doll when the Alien dragged him into a shadowy corridor. A moment later they were both gone.
As Lex clung to the ledge, something rolled past her shoulder—Sebastian’s vintage Pepsi cap. It tumbled end over end as it fell into the chasm.
Finally, Lex began to climb, hand over hand, until she reached the lip of the ledge. Pulling herself up onto it she looked around, finding the area around the shattered bridge and the corridor beyond it deserted. There was virtually no sign of Sebastian De Rosa.
Turning her back on the abyss, Lex moved into another corridor. As the beam of her flashlight dimmed, she realized that the battery was dying. Before it faded completely, however, she checked her compass to orient herself—only to discover that it had been shattered in the fall.
Lex cursed.
For the first time since she’d entered the pyramid, Lex felt despair. With no light, no compass, no companionship, and only deadly Aliens and savage, invisible Predators lurking about, she knew it was unlikely she would ever get out of this place alive.
Shadows loomed everywhere. Black doorways yawned forbiddingly. Corridors forked and twisted into more tunnels. Lex was hopelessly, irrevocably lost. Increasing her pace, she rounded a corner and ran into a dead end.
“Damn it.”
She turned to retrace her path—and stopped in her tracks when the massive silhouette of a Predator rose to block her.
“The enemy of my enemy is my friend…. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Lex whispered Sebastian’s words like a mantra.
The Predator held a short metal tube in its hand, which he raised. Suddenly twin shafts telescoped out of either end to form a deadly spear. The creature puffed out its barrel chest, and when it did, a deep, undulating, clicking sound emerged from its bull-like throat.
Then the Predator swung its spear, gripped it with both hands and plunged it into the stone floor. The meaning was clear—it was time to fight.
Go ahead, make my day, Lex thought with a bravado she didn’t feel.
Motionless now, the Predator cocked its head. Its eyes glowed faintly in the oppressive gloom. Lex felt a strange electric warmth tingling her chest, her arms, her spine. She got the distinct impression that the creature had used some device to scan her.
Having determined his mark, the warrior raised the spear again, aimed its barbed tip at Lex’s heart, then froze, still poised to strike.
As if hypnotized by the grim tableau of her own doom, Lex stood erect and defiant, waiting for the fatal stab.
Slowly, without taking her eyes off the creature, she pulled off the pack that held the Predator’s gun and presented it. When he refused to take it, she set the pack on the floor and slid it toward him.
An endless moment passed. Then the Predator lowered its spear and scooped up the pack—just as the elongated head of an Alien warrior emerged from the shadows behind it.
Lex opened her mouth to cry a warning, but, sensing danger, the Predator whirled to strike before she could even utter a sound.
Swinging furiously, the Alien struck the spear from Scar’s fist. A second blow sent the Predator reeling to the ground. Even before the warrior’s back hit the cold stone, the snarling Alien was on him. Its tail lashed from side to side, its bony segments struck sparks on the walls and its claws shredded Scar’s armor.
The Predator tried vainly to dislodge the monster, but the Alien dug in harder, ripping gouts of flesh out from beneath the armor. Scar howled and jabbed. The Alien pulled back its head, opening its jaws to spray hot spittle on the Predator’s mask.
Scar’s fingers tore at the Alien’s hide until acid blood seeped from a dozen wounds. The Alien then leaned closer to Scar’s face. Its jaws opened as wide as a snake swallowing its prey. Its interior mouth moved forward, slathering over Scar’s flesh, its teeth gnashing grotesquely.
The Predator showed signs of weakness. Its struggles became less violent, and it seemed to Lex that the creature was as close to accepting its death as she had been just a few seconds before. Finally, Scar lay still, its sightless eye slits staring impassively at the fate looming above it.
The Alien hissed triumphantly, then tucked its head down to deliver the killing bite to Scar’s exposed throat.
Only then did the Predator strike. Using the Alien’s weight against it, Scar rolled backwards, throwing the Alien over its head in what looked to Lex like a kind of judo move. To her horror, the Alien had been tossed in her direction. Reaching down, she snatched the Predator’s spear from the ground and raised it with both hands.
The Alien bounced off the narrow walls of the tunnel and righted itself. But this time it was facing new prey—Lex.
Scar roared and turned to face its opponent just as a second Alien leaped out of the shadows—the alpha-Alien.
The large Alien, its body burned by a Predator net, threw itself at Scar with all its might. The Predator pressed its back to the wall and drew a throwing disk. The device unfolded with an electric hum, revealing ten-inch blades that projected from its edges.
But Scar never had a chance to use it.
Unleashing an unearthly screech, the alpha-Alien struck the Predator full on the chest, bringing him down. Locked in a deadly tango, Scar and the Alien rolled end over end as the Predator used its own claws to pound the monster’s black, ravaged hide.
Taking its cue from the alpha-Alien, the smaller creature facing Lex also charged, jaws snapping, teeth gnashing. The monster leaped in a high arc, intending to come down with its full weight on the frail human.
But that maneuver proved to be the Alien’s undoing. With calculated calm, Lex stepped back and propped the Predator spear against the hard stone floor. When the Alien completed its jump, it landed on the tip of the sharp spear, impaling itself.
With a dying shriek that shook dust off the walls, the Alien thrashed and bucked on the end of the shaft. Lex struggled to hold the spear steady, keeping the monster twisting on it at bay. Acid blood splashed the walls and coursed down the shaft, melting the metal. Still the screaming horror dangling on her spear refused to die. Risking chemical burns that would easily dissolve the flesh of her hands to the bone, Lex tilted the spear upward so that the Alien’s own struggles, its own weight would drive the spear deeper into its black body.
Meanwhile, Scar and the alpha-Alien were still locked in deadly combat. The Predator had rolled out from under its foe and had recovered its disk. Again and again, the Predator drove the long, gleaming blades into the monster’s thick hide. The Alien yowled and raked the Predator, even as great rivulets of burning acid flowed from multiple wounds, pitting Scar’s shattered armor and scorching his pale gray flesh.
Lex risked a quick glance at the Predator before Alien jaws snapped at her face. The monstrosity she’d impaled refused to die, and as it slid lower on the shaft, it tried to bite her. Lex shook the spear, spraying sizzling drops of acid all over the walls and floor. The Alien screamed again, and so did Lex as the first drop of acid touched the end of her glove.
Recoiling, Lex released the spear and the Alien with it. Both struck the wall, where the monster twitched once, then stilled. Lex gave the Alien a swift kick to the head, then a second—and for good measure a third, just to make sure it was dead. The Alien’s jaws gaped open, flecked with foam. Its internal mouth hung limply in its skull. Blood no longer flowed from its wounds.
“The bastard’s dead.”
Now Lex knew that these things were mortal. She had actually killed one—and it felt good.
Suddenly, the floor trembled under her boots as the pyramid shifted again. For a moment, nothing else happened. Then the “dead end” wall rumbled as it slid up to the ceiling, to reveal another chamber beyond.
Lex saw movement and threw herself against the wall. Still grappling, Scar and the Alien rolled past her.
Pinning the Alien to the ground, Scar raised the disk for a decapitating blow. But before the blades reached its throat, the monster slithered out of Scar’s grasp, and the blades splintered on
the stone floor. Grabbing one of the long, cylindrical horns that projected out of the Alien’s spine, the Predator climbed onto its back and slashed at its gleaming skull with the broken knives.
The Alien tried to dislodge him, and both tumbled end over end, through the door into the new chamber.
Lex could see that there was more light in the next room, but she hesitated. If she went the other way, she could slip away from the Predator and maybe get out of there alive.
Then Lex laughed.
Fat chance of that. If Scar didn’t get her, the Aliens would.
But there was more reason to stay. Perhaps it was her curiosity, or perhaps it was something more primal—a kind of base admiration—but Lex had just watched the most dedicated hunter in the universe take on nature’s most perfect killing machine.
A part of her simply wanted to see who won.
Limping, she approached the door. All along the floor there were patches of sickly green blood and smoldering holes in the stone where the Alien had shed what passed for blood. Lex followed the grisly trail to the doorway.
In the dim light, she saw a long corridor lined with columns. The walls and pillars were elaborately etched with complex hieroglyphics. The battle still raged, with the combatants wrestling in the center of the passageway. It appeared as if the Predator was weakening—and this time Lex sensed it was not a feint. Though he still wielded the shattered throwing disk, his blows were less powerful, and none were mortal. It was only a matter of time before Scar would be dead and Lex would be alone with the thing that had killed him.
But Lex was in for a surprise.
With a howl of defiance, the Predator hurled the Alien aside in a final show of strength. The Alien slammed against a set of pillars and dislodged several huge stones from the ceiling. They came down in a cloud of dust and debris.
Scar staggered back to avoid being crushed—and blundered into Lex.
They shared a startled look, and before Scar raised the disk in his hand, they heard the angry hiss.
Together they turned to see more Aliens—four of them—scrabbling across the floor and along the ceiling. One, who was tossing masonry stones aside, lowered its head and seethed at them. Lex realized the purpose of the troops were to free the alpha-Alien, who had become trapped by the avalanche of debris.
[AVP] - Aliens vs. Predator Page 17
