Junior uttered a last, faint, hopeless cry as the heavy door slammed shut in front of him, sealing off the storage chamber. At the same time the showers opened up. Exhausted, terrified men, all with varying degrees of smoke or burn damage, hovered motionless in the corridor as the water poured down.

A noise from behind the door then, a distant skittering sound. Things that were not hands exploring, not-fingers scraping at their surroundings. The trapped alien was hunting, searching, for a way out. Gradually the noise ceased. 155 155

A couple of the survivors looked at one another as if about to burst into cheers. Ripley anticipated them curtly.

?It’s not over.?

One of the men retorted angrily, ?Bullshit. It’s inside, the door worked. We’ve got it.?

?What are you talking about??Aaron challenged her. ?We got the bastard trapped, just like you planned it.?

Ripley didn’t even look at him. She didn’t have to explain herself because the silence was suddenly rocked by an ear-splitting concussion. A few of the men winced and a couple turned to run.

The rest gaped in amazement at the door, in which a huge convex dent had suddenly appeared. The echo of contact continued to cannonade along the multiple corridors. Before it had faded entirely a second thunderous boom reverberated through the antechamber and a second bulge appeared in the door.

?Son of a bitch,?Aaron muttered aloud, ?that’s a ceramocarbide door.?

Dillon wasn’t listening to him. A survivor of another kind, he was watching Ripley. She hadn’t moved, so neither did he. If she started running he’d follow close on her heels, without any intention of stopping.

But she continued to hold her ground as a third dent manifested itself. His ears rang. This is a lady I wish I’d known before, he mused silently. A lady who could change a man, alter the course and direction of his life. She could have changed mine. But that was before. Too late now. Been too late for a long time.

No more concussive vibrations rattled his eardrums. No fourth bulge appeared in the barrier. Dead silence ruled the corridor. Gradually everyone’s attention shifted from 156

Alan Dean Foster

that no longer perfect but still intact doorway back to the single woman in their midst.

When she slowly sat down and closed her eyes, back against one wall, the unified sigh of relief that filled the room was like the last failing breeze that marks the passing of a recent storm.

157 XI -

The survivors gathered in the assembly hall, reduced in number but expanded in spirit. Dillon stood before them, waiting to make sure all were present. Only then did he begin.