Disclaimer: I own nothing except for my OCs.

A.N: Strong language and gore.

A.N#2: Wrote to a hodge podge of songs, like Luke Howard's "August," Gregory Douglass' "Alibis," and The Hope Arsenal's "Wake Your Soul."

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"If you dissect a bird / to diagram the tongue, / you'll cut the chord / articulating song."
―Sylvia Plath, The Collected Poems

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Ypsilon's Quotient

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My name was Dr. Yulie Larson, and I was a fucking idiot.

If I'd known how today would've ended, I would've stayed in bed. Or left on a shuttle. Or shot myself. Any option would've been better. To anyone listening, here was some context: I was a xenobiologist for the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, tasked to study Xenomorphs. Specifically, their brainwaves. The bugs' sheer potential had corporate pissing themselves to weaponize their killing power. If we could somehow harness the Xenomorph, tame it, the Company would become unstoppable.

Needless to say, every attempt to control the bugs resulted in failure. The growing conclusion among the Company's science community was XX121 was too indomitable, too unknowable. They'd never become willing servants. Of course, that was when someone had the bright idea of inserting human consciousness into a Xenomorph. Instead of taming the creature, they said, why not cut out the middle man and put on the bug suit ourselves?

That's where I came in.

Even as I replayed this all back to myself, I realized how deep in the FlavorAid I was. I won't deny my part in my current predicament: I'd volunteered for the assignment. Asked for it, even. Was it out of curiosity? The chance to be on the cutting edge of science? To discover something that would sear my name into history? Maybe it was a combination of all three. Maybe it was simply the mind outracing the heart, or some bullshit like that. No matter the reason, I was stupid enough to believe everything would work out.

I probably deserved this.

Due to the insanity of the project, it was deemed off the books. Way off the books. The only people who knew of the experiment was myself, the bigwigs who sanctioned it, and fifteen others, including a small marine dispatch. We were sequestered to a backwater world well away from any trade routes or prying eyes. Cue in three and a half years of work, mountains of specimens, and shitty coffee.

Spoiler alert: it fucking worked. But not the way it was meant to, not at all.

When we finally came to the live trials, I wanted to be first. Call it arrogance. I was supposed to settle into a lobotomized Xenomorph drone, make contact, then pop back out. Simple. The bug and I'd been hooked up and everything. Computer simulations indicated a successful match. I flipped the switch and knew darkness.

Arrogance made me think I had the bugs figured out, but I was wrong. I knew that now. There'd always be something about the Xenomorph beyond humanity's ability to measure and define. Because when I woke up, it wasn't where I was supposed to be.

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Proprioperception was how someone knew where to put their feet even when they weren't looking. Groaning, I tried turning my head but found it tethered in place. I instinctively tried to open nonexistent eyes and suddenly saw. No . . . felt. I could smell the bindings holding me down, could hear the age of the concrete beneath me. If I concentrated, I could even sense the soil beneath the compound. Everything was coloured in shades of gray, molded from electrons. I breathed in the microcosm of my cage and understood everything.

I was in the Xenomorph Queen's body.

It took a moment for the disorientating panic to subside. The Queen wasn't even connected to the circuit. She was on the other side of the facility, lobotomized for study but nothing more. I tried to assert my logic and remain calm. Well, at least I can confirm our theories on Xenomorphs' vision through electromagnetism, I thought. Despite the fuck-up, I couldn't help the burst of excitement. I was the first human to experience the world as a Xenomorph. Hoo-rah.

First order of business: get off the floor.

I wrenched upward, the bindings snapping like toothpicks. Trying to get to my feet was like standing on backward-facing stilts. The legs were digitigrade, contorted in all ways different than my human own. When I managed to stand, I hunched to avoid hitting the ceiling with my comb. I glanced at the far wall. There was supposed to be a guard watching over the Queen, but after three and a half years of a vegetated state, people didn't expect her to move. When I bumped my snout against the observation glass, no one came screaming.

"I'm in here!" I tried to say. My voice came out in a horrific screech. I instantly shut up. After being stuck with the marines for a few years, it was clear they were all trigger-happy in some way. They'd blast my face off, no questions asked. If I were to untangle this snafu, I needed to force them to see who I was. By now they should've realized the experiment had gone wrong and were putting two and two least, I hoped so. Wouldn't that be a way to go, I thought. Achieving a scientific marvel and then dying because some marine couldn't keep his finger off the trigger.

I reached out and stroked a wall with a long, dark hand. Stress cracks shone like in my vision as white lines, thin as spiderweb strands. Weakness. Crouching, I launched my shoulder into the wall. The cracks grew, singing. I rammed the wall again, struggling against time as well. Someone must've heard the racket by now and were coming to investigate. Probably with guns.

By the fourth assault the concrete shattered and I was free to the outside world. I lifted my head and sucked in a breath, getting a sense of direction. I decided to go to the nearby field my colleges and I often visited for exercise. I took a step and promptly faceplanted in the dirt. Coordinating between four arms, massive head, strange legs, and a tail was a lot harder than standing. I forced myself up and took a shaky step. By the third one I found my centre of gravity. At the twentieth I was running, sailing over the landscape in bounding strides. Strength coiled in my legs. I could run mountains.

A part of me mourned. When I transferred back, I would never feel this power again for the rest of my life. A greater part danced for the promotion—even better, fame—waiting for me. Everyone who'd ever doubted my pursuits would eat out of my hand. I opened my mouth and released the inner piston nestled possible, my vision sharpened as the secondary mouth sampled the air. Amazing. It must act as a sensory organ as well, I thought. I couldn't wait to tell the others.

Before I knew it, I'd reached the field. A small slope descended into it, offering the perfect vantage point to see my message. With the barbed end of my tail I carved Y-U-L-I-E in the soil. I turned to admire my handiwork. This should get their attention, I thought. Try to shoot me now.

After some awkward positioning, I sat down and waited for the marines to come, eager for the moment their fear would morph into awe.

Except they never came.

It was hard to tell the passage of time in the Xenomorph's body. The cold didn't affect my carapace, so I didn't shiver, nor was there need to expel waste. There wasn't even hunger. Nothing helped track the time like a human's discomfort would. When it became dark, there was no ingrained fear of an outside attack. I sat in the gray void of electrons, wishing for my wristwatch. Stars gleamed above me in tiny punches of white. As scientifically ground-breaking as it was to see as a Xenomorph, I couldn't wait to return to the colour spectrum.

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By the following morning I tried to ignore the growing unease. It must've been over nineteen planetary hours by now. Were the marines just taking their time to form an attack? They'd better not this useless after three years of guard duty, I thought. As I sat and waited, it dawned on me that we hadn't figured what'd come next. We'd run simulations, but at the end of the day there was no way of knowing how long a human consciousness could last in an extended transfer. How long could I be trapped in a body not my own before my sense of self degraded?

I shook my head in an attempt to dislodge the thoughts. No use thinking like that. No use freaking out just because the marines were late. Still, what was stalling them? I debated leaving my message. Well, I thought, looking down at all four of my hands, maybe I can handle a few bullets. My lips wrinkled with my mental frown. Fuck it. Let's get this over with.

This time I didn't run to the compound, cautious of an ambush or other attack. I kept pausing at intermittent intervals to sample the electrons with my inner piston, hoping to get a clue before I stepped in metaphorical shit.

I was about three quarters the way to the facility when I tasted a coppery pungency. The smell grew thicker until it was too strong to ignore. Blood, and lots of it. A sudden clutch of hunger stabbed me. I paused. Though I was the sole essence animating the body, it seemed outside stimuli were still capable of manipulating the Queen's instincts. I shoved the hunger down and kept going. That'd be awkward if I saw my colleagues and grew hungry.

The blood soon mixed with a sharper, more acrid tang. Gunpowder. I slowed, hackles rising. What the fuck happened? Not a firefight over my account, I hoped. I was nearly to the lab now, pace a crawl. Scents I didn't recognize began interlacing the others, like the strange musk that seemed to linger in certain spots. I stepped around the bend and saw the compound. I took one look and the unease that'd been brewing all morning burst into full-throated dread.

The lab was in tatters.

Outwardly, everything seemed intact. All outer walls in place, nothing unseemly. But with my new sensory ability, I could sense inside the building itself. Bullet holes peppered in the concrete. Equipment sparked and smoked. Blood coated the walls like gristly paint. Bodies—

A deep hissing emerged from my mouth. Could Xenomorphs have panic attacks? Was this body even physiologically capable? I didn't know how long I was paralyzed, too horrified to move. Maybe someone's still alive, I thought at last. A survivor. Anyone. Deeper still, I prayed for a functioning computer.

I circled around. I was looking for a way in when I came across one of the my colleagues lying face-up on the ground. Her mouth was in an O of surprise, eyes wide. It was Dr. Sarah Hofstadter. I picked her up with my primary hands. She weighed as much as a flower, just as delicate. I turned her over. She'd been stabbed with a two-pronged weapon in the back, her stomach and diaphragm punctured. Her death would've been agonizing. I struggled against a new surge of hunger as I lay her down, disgusted at my reaction.

That's when I saw who'd killed her. It was a little further away, face-down, dead. It was human-shaped, bipedal and composed of similar anatomy, but that was where the similarities ended. It must've been at least seven feet tall, covered in strange multi-plated armor and net suit. Long tubes descended from its elongated crown, similar to dreadlocks. When I turned it over onto its back, I saw painted skulls decorated its waist. His. I saw through his metal skirt to notice he had external genitalia somewhat similar to a human's. His torso was riddled with bullet holes almost too numerous to count. His blood smelled foul.

I've heard of the species before. They were yautja, the predators of the galaxy. I'd read enough of the research conducted on their kind to know they lived to hunt challenging prey, humans included. I had colleagues who were fascinated with the yautja, but I never shared their interests. Then what were the hunters doing here? I swung my head, as if to search for the reason. Weyland-Yutani had specifically chosen this place because it was far away from anything. Literally all the terraformed colonies in the quadrant to choose from, and these yautja picked this tiny facility? Doesn't matter now, I thought. Just focus on finding a computer to get out of this body.

I left the dead hunter and bulled my way through one of the entrances. It was a tight fit, but as soon as I made it past the door the hallways grew large enough for me to crawl on my stomach. The air was saturated with blood and gunpowder and pulverized concrete. I came across another yautja, dead. Six marines surrounded him, also dead, all sliced up. One marine—Higgins—had a goddamn spear in his chest.

I kept going, struggling to keep calm. More dead bodies, more ruined rooms. At certain points it seemed like grenades had gone off, walls blasted through. I passed the main lab that'd been my life for the past three and a half years and smelled the equipment cooking inside. Sparks sputtered and spat. Someone inside was curled in a net, except the net was too tiny, contorting the person into a bloody mess. I moved on, trying to shove the mounting dread back.

I needed to find my human body. I turned down a hallway for the med bay, knowing the high probability it would be there. I arrived at the glass observation deck. When I looked inside, it took me several minutes to understand what I was seeing.

My body lay beneath a fallen medicine cabinet. By sheer bad luck, the confluence of my head's position and the cabinet's trajectory had aligned perfectly. I reached inside the med bay and caught one of my ankles. My head painted a bloody smear as I pulled myself out. Yesterday it had a heartbeat. Breathed. Drank coffee. I cradled myself to the Queen's chest. Like Sarah, I weighed nothing. For fuck's sake, don't panic, I thought, but it was useless. Oh, god. I could never go back. Even if the equipment was prepped and working, I would have no living body to transfer to. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck—

I wished I'd never gotten out of bed yesterday morning. I wished I'd never volunteered for this experiment. I wished I'd never left Earth. I wished for so many things I didn't realize I was trembling. The weight of my new reality slammed like a semi truck and suddenly I was screaming. I didn't know how long I howled, but when I finally tapered off, two immediate things became clear.

One, I was beyond screwed.

Two, I needed to get out of this place.

At first I tried wiggling backwards, as if careful not to damage anything. I hadn't been claustrophobic at that point, but suddenly everything was too much. I surged upwards, straining against the metal vents and concrete ceiling. The ceiling rumbled, but held. I surged again, not caring I was starting to feel pain, not caring my carapace was getting cut. Get! Me! Out! My legs were pistons, my body the compressed air. When I finally exploded through, I was screaming again, this time from pain.

One of my human arms had snapped off in the struggle and now dribbled blood. I stared down at myself, hysterical laughter filling me like helium did a ballon. Death by fucking medicine cabinet. Goddamn. I tried laughing but what came out was like a screeching hiccup. Worse still was when I tried crying, nothing happened. There was no release. I felt like a zoo animal stuck in a cage, unable to do anything except rock back and forth.

After an unknown amount of time, I eventually lay my human remains under a tree. I placed Sarah next to them, then forced myself to think. We checked in with the Company every three days, which meant they would soon realize something was wrong. Policy dictated they would have to investigate. At best, I would have to wait two weeks for a rescue.

For the first time since I woke up in the Queen's body, I smiled. Once I convinced the search party I was me, I could help them reconstruct the lab again. They could provide a comatose patient and I could transfer back. Not all was lost.

I was still smiling when I heard a distant crash in the bushes. I swung my head, inner mouth extending. A survivor? I pounded after the sound, bulling through tree branches and vines. I didn't even care if it was a gun-happy marine. The landscape shifted, sloping upwards. I burst through the trees and skidded to a halt.

A lone yautja survivor leaned against some rocks several feet away. Like the others he was male, decked in patches of armor, tresses stopping at mid-chest. But unlike the others, his mask had been discarded, giving me a view of the crab-like face. I'd seen autopsy photos of dissected yautja, but never a live one one before. Deep-set eyes blazed at me beneath heavy brows, almost human in their expression. Two sets of tusked mandibles twitched around a lipless, toothy maw. Spikes dotted the sides of his forehead and elongated crown. A mark appeared seared in his forehead, three lines together. Rings encircled his thick neck.

He was not without injury: a rudimentary splint bound his lower right leg and gel covered bullet wounds across his abdomen. He'd been tapping at a wrist computer the moment I appeared but it kept hissing and sparking electricity. He abandoned it unsheathe two vicious-looking wrist blades. Instead of stabbing himself like I'd assumed, he stood on his good leg and held ready to strike.

Something was growling, deep and rasping. It took a moment to realize the awful sound was coming from me.

"I should kill you," I said. My words may've been garbled hisses, but the threat was clear. His people had destroyed my lab and killed my colleagues. I took a step forward, halving the distance between us.

He sucked in a breath and roared, mandibles flaring to their widest extent. I leaned forward and roared back. Suddenly the urge to eat was overwhelming. I broke off, hating the hunger pangs more than I hated this injured hunter. Until my mind withered, this body was mine to control, not the other way around. The anger drained. It wasn't this half-naked thing's fault I was stuck like this, it was mine. It was mine for demanding to volunteer first instead of having a random grunt take point, mine for being over-confident in the first place. Mine, mine, mine.

The yautja's mandibles moved in agitated jerks when I didn't attack, wrist blades still poised to strike. Some part of me admired his idiocy in the face of overwhelming odds. Yeah, not today buddy, I thought, turning away. You live for now. Maybe he'd die on his own. All what mattered was the Company rescue crew and transferring my consciousness out of this Xenomorph.

I returned to my Y-U-L-I-E scrawl in the field. Suddenly the effort seemed pathetic, childish. Just two weeks, I thought, holding the hope close. Just need to hold out for two weeks.

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It was early morning when I felt the tremor of something big landing not too far away. I climbed to my feet in joy. It'd been ten days since the lab was destroyed, ten days of eating wildlife and staving boredom. Without electrical equipment it was difficult to be one hundred percent accurate, but it seemed I didn't exhibit any mental disintegration. I still knew who I was. Despite the promising outlook, I started and ended each day with a mental check-in as a precaution.

I am Dr. Yulie Larson, human, born 2275 A.D on Gelenus III, human colony 54A-5996, sixth district. My parents are Michelle Bourbeau and Christian Larson, I had a dog named Brownie, my favorite colour is red—

So on and so forth. To pass the time I tried cataloguing all of the body's responses in anticipation to the Company's questions once I returned to a human body. And boy, I guessed there would be a lot. I daydreamed of the press conferences I'd give. Maybe I'd write a book. After, of course, I was given clearance and my NDAs were waived away. Maybe I'd be given my own research branch at the Company. And a pay raise.

Throughout the days I caught glimpses of the lone yautja. Outside of a heavy limp he seemed to be surviving fine. In the beginning he'd moved around the compound, dragging his kind away. He'd even removed the spear that'd been stuck in Higgins' chest, hiding any evidence they'd come through. After that I'd assumed he'd leave the same way he'd come, but he stayed. I sensed him lurking, keeping his distance in the trees, as if tracking my movements. The idea of him hunting me was laughable. I could stomp on him if I wanted. Better leave before the Company catches you, I thought. You'd be brought to a lab and studied faster than you could sneeze.

Speaking of the devil, where was he? I tried scouring my senses for him and found nothing. Usually he was at the field's treeline this time of morning. Maybe he'd also felt the tremor and decided to get out of Dodge. Smart fucking choice.

Despite my eagerness to see human faces, I knew I had to play my cards right. They had to see my written name first or I could end up with a mouthful of M56 smartgun fire. I stayed where I was, pacing the field. They'd have to examine the compound first, which could take hours. Then they would have to expand their search until they found the field, which could take more hours. I've already waited ten days, what's a few more hours? I thought. I was lucky enough the rescue crew had come four days early.

I watched the twin suns creep into midday. Shadows lengthened. My thoughts were still on meeting the Company's crew when I heard heavy footsteps in the grass.

It was the yautja, splint gone. He was limping slowly, twin wrist blades extended. A strange contraption was strapped to his left arm, one I'd never seen him sport before. This time he wore an angular mask, the eye lenses dark. I faced him and hissed. Just because I didn't kill him didn't mean I wanted him in my space, and certainly not this close. Even though he was half my height he seemed so small, so inconsequential. What could he hope to achieve against a Xenomorph Queen?

"You should be hiding," I said to him. I smiled long teeth at him. "My people are coming."

A blend of curious amusement tickled me as he kept approaching. How close was he planning on getting? Did he expect me to attack this time? He was maybe twenty feet away when he finally stopped. A clicking growl emerged from his throat as he stared at me, blades ready. He didn't move, as if waiting.

Suddenly something didn't feel right. I tensed, rising higher on my toes to extended my secondary mouth. The hell? There's more of you? Sure enough I counted fourteen others scattered among the treeline, positioned in an rough hemicircle. Some carried what looked like cables. Even as I wondered where they'd all come from, my guts twisted. Staggering from the dawning realization, I looked down at the yautja and found the contraption directed at me.

A net exploded in my face and chest. I reared back with a snarl. The material was surprisingly strong, straining against my attempts to break free. I immediately turned tail and began to run. Others came out of the woodwork, seven on each side in a clear flanking maneuver. I could outrun them, easy. After almost two weeks inhabiting the Queen's body, my stride was flawless. This would be ea—

I roared my anger and surprise as something whistled around my legs and bound them together. I ate dirt, skidding several feet as my snout tore up ground. Motherfuckers! It was a bolas, thick as climber's rope and made of the same netting material. The yautja honed on my position, their calls and loud chatters filling the air.

The thoracic limbs were already hopelessly snared, but my primary arms were free. I tried untangling my legs but the cord was twisted worse than headphones in a pocket. I roared again, hoping the sound would buy me time, but instead it seemed to spur the yautja on. Two reached me. Snarling, I rolled to my side and whipped my tail around, hoping to strike at least one of them. I was panicking now, flailing. I couldn't die here. I had to tell the Company the experiment had worked, had to reap the accolades.

I pushed myself up on my main hands and lashed out. The panic became a pressure in my chest and I screamed, my vision whiting. The netting around my snout restricted my movements as I tried to bite. The ends were caught on my comb, stuck like fishing line in a tree branch. There was a loud shot and more netting draped over me. My tail stabbed and struck until it too was bound in netting. I kicked my legs out and was viciously gladdened to feel them connect with a yautja. I hoped all his bones were broken.

The fight was done by the time all fifteen yautja surrounded me. Those with cables now threw them over, binding me over the netting. Soon I was trussed up like some prized hog, my limbs constricted into immobility. A molotov cocktail of exhaustion and frustration burned.

A new yautja stood over me. From my angle he seemed monstrously large. How had I ever thought them small?

"Please listen to me," I said, trying to form words in the screeching hisses. Please, for the love of God, understand me. "I'm actually human. Jesus Christ, this is a mistake. I'm not actually a Queen, I'm Yulie Larson. Please lis—"

A large metal tube was placed around my netted mouth, muzzling my jaws. I tried shaking it off, but moving under all the netting and cords was impossible. The hunter pressed a clawed foot on my head and roared above me, shaking a fist. The others joined with bellows of their own. The humiliation was searing.

I was glad when they stopped celebrating. Now it was clear they weren't here to kill, not after all the nonlethal efforts to keep me alive. Some part of me wished they did. I hadn't done much research on the yautja culture, but I could only guess my fate wasn't going to be pleasant at all. The yautja began pulling me, each taking a cable in hand. Soon we neared my message and I tried to get their attention with one last struggle. No! Go around! No one noticed my protests and I was dragged over the name carved there, erasing it.

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TBC