'I didn't have time for sight-seeing, and she didn't offer to show me around.' She nodded toward the girl.
'Right. Well, she must know about supplements because she's not showing any signs of critical deficiencies. Smart little thing.'
'How is she mentally?' Ripley sipped at her coffee, staring at the waif in the chair. The child's skin was like parchment over the backs of her hands.
'I can't tell for sure, but her motor responses are good. I think it's too early to call it brainlock. I'd say she's on hold.'
'Call it anything you want.' Gorman rose and headed for the exit. 'Whatever it is, we're wasting our time trying to talk to her.' He strode out of the side room and back into Operations to join Burke and Bishop in staring at the colony's central computer terminal. Dietrich headed off in another direction.
For a while Ripley watched the three men, who were intent on the terminals Hudson had resurrected, then knelt alongside the girl. Gently she brushed the child's unkempt hair back out of her eyes. She might have been combing a statue for all the response she elicited. Still smiling, she proffered the steaming cup she was holding.
'Here, try this. If you're not hungry, you must be thirsty. I'l bet it gets cold in that vent bubble, what with the heat off and everything.' She moved the cup around, letting the air carry the warm, aromatic smell of the contents to the girl's nostrils 'It's just a little instant hot chocolate. Don't you like chocolate? When the girl didn't react, Ripley wrapped the small hands around the cup, bending the fingers toward each other. Then she tilted hands and cup upward.
Dietrich was correct about the child's motor responses. She drank mechanically and without watching what she was doing Cocoa spilled down her chin, but most of it went down the small throat and stayed down. Ripley felt vindicated.
Not wanting to overwhelm an obviously shrunken stomach she pulled the cup away when it was still half full. 'There wasn't that nice? You can have some more in a minute. I don't know what you've been eating and drinking, and we don't want to make you sick by giving you too much rich stuff too quickly. She pushed at the blond tresses again.
'Poor thing. You don't talk much, do you? That's okay by me You feel like keeping quiet, you keep quiet. I'm kind of the same way. I've found that most people do a lot of talking and they wind up not saying very much. Especially adults when they're talking to children. It's kind of like they enjoy talking at you but not to you. They want you to listen to them all the time but they don't want to listen to you. I think that's pretty stupid Just because you're small doesn't mean you don't have some important things to say.' She set the cup aside and dabbed at the brown-stained chin with a cloth. It was easy to feel the ridge of unfinished bone beneath the tightly drawn skin.
'Uh-oh.' She grinned broadly. 'I made a clean spot here Now I've gone and done it. Guess I'll just have to do the whole thing. Otherwise nothing will match.'
From an open supply packet she withdrew a squeeze bottle full of sterilized water and used it to soak the cloth she was holding. Then she applied the makeshift scrubber firmly to the girl's face, wiping away dirt and accumulated grime in addition to the remaining cocoa spots. Throughout the operation the child sat quietly. But the bright blue eyes shifted and seemed to focus on Ripley for the first time.
She felt a surge of excitement and fought to suppress it 'Hard to believe there's a little girl under all this.' She made a show of examining the cloth's surface. 'Enough dirt there to file a mining claim on.' Bending over, she stared appraisingly at the newly revealed face. 'Definitely a little girl. And a pretty one, at that.'
She looked away just long enough to assure herself that no one from Operations was about to barge in. Any interruption at this critical moment might undo everything that she'd worked so hard to accomplish with the aid of a little hot chocolate and clean water.
No need to worry. Everyone in Operations was still clustered around the main terminal. Hudson was seated at the console fingering controls while the others looked on.
A three-dimensional abstract of the colony drifted across the main screen, lazy geometric outlines tumbling from left to right, then bottom to top, as Hudson manipulated the program. The comtech was neither playing nor showing off; he was hunting something. No rude comments spilled from his lips now, no casual profanity filled the air. It was work time. If he cursed at all, it was to himself. The computer knew all the answers. Finding the right questions was an agonizingly slow process.
Burke had been inspecting other equipment. Now he shifted his position for a better view as he whispered to Gorman.
'What's he scanning for?'
'PDTs. Personal data transmitters. Every colonist has one surgically implanted as soon as they arrive.'
'I know what a PDT is,' Burke replied mildly. 'The Company manufactures them. I just don't see any point in running a PDT scan. Surely if there was anyone else left alive in the complex, we'd have found them by now. Or they'd have found us.'
'Not necessarily.' Gorman's reply was polite without being deferential. Technically Burke was along on the expedition as an observer for the Company, to look after its financial interests. His employer was paying for this little holiday excursion in tandem with the colonial administration, but what authority he had was largely unwritten. He could give advice but not orders. This was a military expedition, and Gorman was in charge. On paper Burke was his equal. The reality was very different.
'Someone could be alive but unable to move. Injured, or maybe trapped inside a damaged building. Sure the scan's a long shot, but procedure demands it. We have to run the check.' He turned to the comtech. 'Everything functioning properly, Hudson?'
'If there's anyone alive within a couple of kilometres of base central, we'll read it out here.' He tapped the screen. 'So far I've got zip except for the kid.'
Wierzbowski offered a comment from the far side of the room. 'Don't PDTs keep broadcasting if the owner dies?'
'Not these new ones.' Dietrich was sorting through her instruments. 'They're partly powered by the body's own electrical field. If the owner fades out, so does the signal. A stiff's electrical capacitance is nil. That's the only drawback to using the body as a battery.'
'No kidding?' Hudson spared the comely medtech a glance 'How can you tell if somebody's AC or DC?'
'No problem in your case, Hudson.' She snapped her medica satchel shut. 'Clear case of insufficient current.'
It was easier to find another clean cloth than to try to scrub out the first one. Ripley was working on the girl's small hands now excavating dirt from between the fingers and beneath the nails Pink skin emerged from behind a mask of dark grime. As she cleaned, she kept up a steady stream of reassuring chatter.
'I don't know how you managed to stay alive with everybody else gone away, but you're one brave kid, Rebecca.'
A sound new to Ripley's ears, barely audible. 'N-newt.'
Ripley tensed and looked away so her excitement wouldn't show. She kept moving the washcloth as she leaned closer. 'I'm sorry, kid, I didn't hear you. Sometimes my hearing's not so good. What did you say?'
'Newt. My n-name's Newt. That's what everybody calls me Nobody calls me Rebecca except my brother.'
Ripley was finishing off the second hand. If she didn't respond, the girl might lapse back into silence. At the same time she had to be careful not to say anything that might upset her. Keep it casual and don't ask any questions.
'Well, Newt it is, then. My name's Ripley— and people cal me Ripley. You can call me anything you like, though.' When no reply was forthcoming from the girl, Ripley lifted the smal hand she'd just finished cleaning and gave it a formal shake.
'Pleased to meet you, Newt.' She pointed at the disembodied doll head that the girl still clutched fiercely in one hand. 'And who is that? Does she have a name? I bet she does. Every dol has a name. When I was your age, I had lots of dolls, and every one of them had a name. Otherwise, how can you tell them apart?'
Newt glanced down at the plastic sphere with its vacant
glassy eyes. 'Casey. She's my only friend.'
'What about me?'
The girl looked at her so sharply that Ripley was taken aback. The assurance in Newt's eyes bespoke a hardness that was anything but childish. Her tone was flat, neutral.
'I don't want you for a friend.'
Ripley tried to conceal her surprise. 'Why not?'
'Because you'll be gone soon, like the others. Like everybody.' She gazed down at the doll head. 'Casey's okay She'll stay with me. But you'll go away. You'll be dead and you'll leave me alone.'
There was no anger in that childish declamation, no sense of accusation or betrayal. It was delivered coolly and with complete assurance, as though the event had already occurred It was not a prediction, but rather a statement of fact soon to take place. It chilled Ripley's blood and frightened her more than anything that had happened since the dropship had departed the safety of the orbiting Sulaco.
'Oh, Newt. Your mom and dad went away like that, didn't they? You just don't want to talk about it.' The girl nodded, eyes downcast, staring at her knees. Her fingers were white around the doll head. 'They'd be here if they could, honey,' Ripley told her solemnly. 'I know they would.'
'They're dead. That's why they can't come see me anymore They're dead like everybody else.' This delivered with a cold certainty that was terrifying to see in so small a child.
'Maybe not. How can you be sure?'
Newt raised her eyes and stared straight at Ripley. Smal children do not look adults in the eye like that, but Newt was a child in stature only. 'I'm sure. They're dead! They're dead, and soon you'll be dead, and then Casey and I'll be alone again.'
Ripley didn't look away and she didn't smile. She knew this girl could see straight through anything remotely phony 'Newt. Look at me, Newt. I'm not going away. I'm not going to leave you and I'm not going to be dead. I promise. I'm going to stay around. I'll be with you as long as you want me to.'
The girl's eyes remained downcast. Ripley could see her struggling with herself, wanting to believe what she'd just heard trying to believe. After a while she looked up again.
'You promise?'
'Cross my heart.' Ripley performed the childish gesture.
'And hope to die?'
Now Ripley did smile, grimly. 'And hope to die.'
Girl and woman regarded one another. Newt's eyes began to brim, and her lower lip to tremble. Slowly the tension fled from her small body, and the indifferent mask she'd pulled across her face was replaced by something much more natural: the look of a frightened child. She threw both arms around Ripley's neck and began to sob. Ripley could feel the tears streaming down the newly washed cheeks, soaking her own neck. She ignored them rocking the girl back and forth in her arms, whispering soothing nothings to her.
She closed her own eyes against the tears and the fear and lingering sensation of death that permeated Hadley Operations Central and hoped that the promise she'd just made could be kept.
The breakthrough with the girl was matched by another in Operations as Hudson let out a triumphant whoop. 'Hah! Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen! Found 'em. Give old Hudson a decent machine and he'll turn up your money, your secrets, and your long-lost cousin Jed.' He rewarded the control console with an affectionate whack. 'This baby's been battered, but she can still play ball.'
Gorman leaned over the comtech's shoulder. 'What kind of shape are they in?'
'Unknown. These colonial PDTs are long on signal and short on details. But it looks like all of them.'
'Where?'
'Over at the atmosphere processing station.' Hudson studied the schematic. 'Sublevel C under the south part of the complex.' He tapped the screen. 'This charmer's a sweetheart when it comes to location.'
Everyone in Operations had clustered around the comtech for a look at the monitor. Hudson froze the colony scan and enlarged one portion. In the centre of the processing station's schematic a cluster of glowing blue dots pulsed like deep-sea crustaceans.
Hicks grunted as he stared at the screen. 'Looks like a town meeting.'
'Wonder why they all went over there?' Dietrich mused aloud. 'I thought we'd decided that this was where they made their last stand?'
'Maybe they were able to make a break for it and secure themselves in a better place.' Gorman turned away, brisk and professional. 'Remember, the processing station still has ful power. That'd be worth a lot. Let's saddle up and find out.'
'Awright, let's go, girls.' Apone was slipping his pack over his shoulders. Operations became a hive of activity. 'They ain't payin' us by the hour.' He glanced at Hudson. 'How do we get over there?'
The comtech adjusted the screen, reducing the magnification. An overview of the colony appeared on the monitor 'There's one small service corridor. It's a pretty good hike Sarge.'
Apone looked to Gorman, waiting for orders. 'I don't know about you, Sergeant,' the lieutenant told him, 'but I'm not fond of long, narrow corridors. And I'd like for everyone to be fresh when we arrive. I'd also like to have the APC's armament backing us up when we go in there.'
'My thoughts exactly, sir.' The sergeant looked relieved He'd been ready to suggest and argue and was glad that neither was going to be necessary. A couple of the troops nodded and looked satisfied. Gorman might be inexperienced in the field, but at least he wasn't a fool.
Hicks yelled back toward the small ready room. 'Hey Ripley, we're going for a ride in the country. You coming?'
'We're both coming.' A few looks of surprise greeted her as she led the girl out of the back room. 'This is Newt. Newt, these are my friends. They're your friends too.'
The girl simply nodded, unwilling to extend that privilege beyond Ripley as yet. A couple of the soldiers nodded to the child as they shouldered their equipment. Burke smiled encouragingly at her. Gorman looked surprised.
Newt looked up at her live friend, still clutching the disembodied doll head tightly in her right hand. 'Where are we going?'
'To a safe place. Soon.'
Newt almost smiled.
The atmosphere in the APC during the ride from colony Operations to the processing station was more subdued than it had been when they'd first roared out of the dropship. The universal devastation; the hollow, wounded buildings; and the unmistakable evidence of hard fighting had put a damper on the Marines' initial high spirits.
It was clear that the cause of the colony's interrupted communications with Earth had nothing to do with its relay satellite or base instrumentation. It had to do with Ripley's critter. The colonists had ceased communicating because something had compelled them to do so. If Ripley was to be believed, that something was still hanging around Undoubtedly the little girl was a storehouse of information on the subject, but no one tried to press questions on her Dietrich's orders. The child's recovery was still too fragile to jeopardize with traumatizing inquiries. So as they rode along in the APC they had to fill in the gaps in Ripley's library disks with their imaginations. Soldiers have active imaginations.
Wierzbowski drove the personnel carrier across the twilight landscape, traversing a causeway that connected the rest of the colony complex to the atmosphere-processing station a kilometre away. Wind tore at the massive vehicle but could not sway it. The APC was designed for comfortable travel in winds up to three hundred kph. A typical Acheronian gale didn't bother it. Behind it, the dropship had settled to ground at the landing field, awaiting the soldiers' return. Ahead, the conical tower of the massive processing unit glowed with a spectra light as it continued with its business of terraforming Acheron's inhospitable atmosphere.
Ripley and Newt sat side by side just aft of the driver's cab Wierzbowski kept his attention on his driving. Within the comparative safety of the heavily armoured vehicle the girl gradually grew more voluble. Though there were at least a dozen questions Ripley badly wanted to ask her, she just sat patiently and listened, letting her charge ramble on Occasionally Newt would offer the answer to an unasked question, anyway. Like now.
'I was be
st at the game.' She hugged the doll head and stared at the opposite wall. 'I knew the whole maze.'
'The "maze"?'Ripley thought back to where they'd found her. 'You mean the air-duct system?'
'Yeah, you know,' she replied proudly. 'And not just the air ducts. I could even get into tunnels that were full of wires and stuff. In the walls, under the floor. I could get into anywhere. I was the ace. I could hide better than anybody. They all said I was cheating because I was smaller than everybody else, but it wasn't 'cause I was smaller. I was just smarter, that's all. And I've got a real good memory. I could remember anyplace I'd been before.'
'You're really something, ace.' The girl looked pleased Ripley's gaze shifted forward. Through the windshield the processing station loomed directly ahead.