User:LordisMangis/Xenomorph
REASON: Overhauled
Alien
Superiors: The Queen
Difficulty: Medium
Guides: Guide to Combat, this page.
Access: Any unwelded vent and anything you can pry or melt with acid.
Duties: Protect the queen, build the nest, multiply.
Departmental Head
Unknown
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Xenomorphs are a vicious alien species reproducing through parasitic means, usually lethal for the host. Their only goals are serving the will of their Queen and spreading further through the Galaxy. Stations without proper vent filtration easily get infested with larvas and become another hive for these creatures. They operate as a hivemind with a simple matriarchal caste system consisting of workers (Drones), guards (Sentinels), Hunters and a singular Queen.
History
The terrible tales of the universe passed around by deep-space ship crews and station cantina patrons often contain legends of bluespace anomalies, treacherous freight routes, and the occasional pirate encounter; However, to a select few, there is a known threat that is far scarier than whatever the natural forces of the universe could produce: Aliens. Among experienced captains and crew, they're known as the biological terror that is responsible for the disappearance of crews and stations across the many systems. To your average spacefarer, they're nothing more than a monster in your closet.
Historians are unsure of when aliens were first encountered or how they came into existence, they often refer to the proliferation of aliens as a pattern more akin to the spread of disease. Most attempts to study these aliens have led to the loss of many scientific sites as well as high-profile biologists, epidemiologists, and zoologists. While Nanotrasen has never publically admitted to it, there are rumors that the corporation had lost a moon installation due to this exact reason. Once the intelligence and wit of these creatures became known to the scientific community, it opened up the doors for study by psychologists, although these studies have yet to progress very far.
Today, the community has only a basic understanding of the biological makeup of these aliens and some concepts of social structures. Scientists know that each alien "serves" a queen and that the hive as a whole work to constantly expand nests and integrate biological resources into the hive. What is not understood is why a creature such as a hyper-intelligent hive-queen often acts outside of its own accords and best interest, almost as it serves a higher power. This has drawn the interest of many theologists and has raised questions as to the origin and purpose of more specialized castes such as alien praetorians and sentinels.
However, the public does not know most of this. Once the true danger of these aliens was discovered by various organizations across the universe, a very tight lid was placed over disseminating knowledge regarding them. For many political powers, the "idea" of aliens served a better purpose as a political tool. While aliens are still viable as fear-mongering devices or biological weapons, it is unlikely that academic documentation regarding the species will ever be declassified.
Fluff
Facehugger
A parasitic cycle in xenomorph production with the appearance of two human hands held together and attached to a spiny, powerful tail. It has a proboscis it uses to implant embryos and provide oxygen while strangling a victim. The finger-like appendages are used for transportation and to attach itself firmly to a host body.
Once implantation is complete, the facehugger falls off and dies. Removal of a facehugger while it is copulating is always fatal for the victim, either because of a snapped neck, trauma from the facehugger ripping off the face of its victim, or the powerfully acidic blood of the xeno.
Like all of the xenomorph species, not much is understood about its growth, motivations, or senses, but it is known that a facehugger can tell the difference between a living humanoid and a non-living humanoid such as corpses or cyborgs and that they are suicidally focused on reproduction. Xenomorphs often use crowds of facehuggers to take down large prey or grouped or well-defended humans.
Larva
Also known as chestbursters because of their method of exodus from the host body, larval xenomorphs are the third known stage in reproduction for that species. While developing in the body, xenomorph embryos attach to blood vessels to absorb nutrients and complete its unstable genetic structure using the host's DNA.
Through an unknown process, this always results in a functioning offspring. This form is small compared to the adult, limbless, and serpentine. They have a strong instinct to hide after forcing their way out through the ribcage and violently tearing their host body apart. If left alone, xenomorph larva will undergo an unknown transformation process to adulthood.
It is believed at this stage that the xenomorph is at its most vulnerable due to its small size and apparent lack of many senses, though this should not be misunderstood—a larva is still deadly. Its powerful thrashing and sharp teeth got it out of a human sternum, after all.
Hunter
This form is usually the last in any given xenomorph's life cycle. There are many variants of the hunter (including forms that do no hunting, per se), but the human form is the most commonly seen on stations for obvious reasons.
The hunter sports a phallic-shaped skull with hidden, mostly useless eyes protected by a one-way transparent dome. It has a host of esoteric senses, most prominently a theorized echolocation (explaining their near-constant hissing) and electroreception, though its primary sense appears to be smell. The scent of pheromones is experimentally shown to be the primary communication device of xenomorphs, most effectively transmitted by the ropey purple weeds the adults spread around the station. It is unknown where this tissue comes from, as xenomorphs refuse to make it in captivity.
The primary byproduct of this weed is the strange substance plasma and as such most corporations are extremely interested in the connection between the xenomorphs and that chemical for production reasons. Like the facehugger, the hunter's blood is highly acidic, and there are rumors that it is capable of eating even through space station hulls, though it must be said that this is only a rumor.
The adult xenomorph is a living weapon, with an exoskeleton thick enough to absorb or redirect most trauma and temperature extremes, scythe-like claws, and a multi-tiered jaw system capable of projecting an acidic compound presumingly from their stomachs. Some varieties of hunter are crested, and most varieties have a heavy tail with protective ridges. Xenomorphs at this stage show semi-sapience and problem-solving abilities, and are capable of using pack-oriented tactics, creative stealth, and psychological manipulation. It is reported that in the presence of enough plasma xenomorphs can communicate in a basic way with sentient species, but there is little evidence to lend credence to such an absurd notion.
Queen
Very few xenomorphs undergo the transformation into queen. It appears to be done only in the case of very specific hive pressures. They are the only xenomorphs capable of laying the eggs that hatch facehuggers. While much larger than the hunters, they're also much slower, but are indeed much tougher. Even accounting for the size difference, a xenomorph queen can take drastically more punishment. A queen is most likely found where there are high levels of plasma, surrounded by hunters and swarms of freshly hatched facehuggers.
They are significantly more intelligent and highly protective of their offspring. While slow, they have all the adaptations and weapons of their previous hunter forms, a larger, thicker crest to protect their brain casing, and higher internal stores of plasma which they can utilize for the shaping of resin, the laying of eggs, destructive survival defences, and even a complex and poorly understood efficient means to form a natural cloak. Like all xenomorphs, there is little information about them.