'What's wrong?'
The jaws of the pale monstrosity had thrust into the air like a springloaded bear-trap, silvery fangs glistening in the the dim light as its lithely muscled, fleshy body lay sprawled on the floor. Chunks and bits of flesh were strewn about wildly from holes that had been punched into the creature's chest cavity, limbs still loose and flesh still supple before rigor-mortis set in.
Across from the pale creature lay another animal-fleshy and squishier than the former, with weird cords of fibrous tissue atop its head. Said head, however, was floating in a pool of its own blood and the dripping walls that made a makeshift tub of sorts. The rest of its body was bitten and torn in several places, seemingly the result of the white monster's jaws.
'Gone' the creature thought to itself, slowly standing back up as its grip slipped away from the dead alien.
Padding over to the remains of the other creature, wet slapping noises echoing throughout the chamber, the alien tore a loose hunk of flesh and brought it to its mouth-the small orifice widened into a circular gape of silvery razors as it sunk its teeth into the meat. A burst of flavor flooded the creature's senses-meaty, tangy, though subdued from decomposition and being left in the dark, wet cave. Still, it was satisfying if nothing else.
The creature somberly swallowed-it wasn't feeling very hungry anyways.
It briefly turned its head up to the sky, tilting it slightly as it remembered watching the massive metal bird leave this place with the remaining two-legged animals-a black creature, like it but also very different had tried to kill it. The pale monster chuffed a bit, walking deeper into the cave as it remembered this from the fields-emphasis on tried.
'Foolish creature. Foolish.' it mused, remembering how it tackled the massive talons of the creature only to be crushed in a vice-like grip. Bits and bobs of it would eventually careen to the earth, the white abomination investigating the sizzling gibs at a later time. They smelled horrible-almost definitely inedible, not good to eat.
But that was in the past. Now, it wandered a new area of the rocky caves-warmer, more well lit, and covered wall to wall in meat. Well, that and odd flat stuff that had a weird smell-it didn't understand it much, but the shapes on it looked oddly...familiar. It was the smaller versions of it that caught its attention. Smaller, and gone, like its sibling.
If it could understand the shuddering feeling within it-that creeping, quivering pang that was felt from head to toe, it might recognize the feeling as fear. But it didn't understand this feeling-not entirely, anyways. There were more of these creatures anyways, so they weren't alone.
But it was certain it was.
It had the entire planet to itself
*
A feeling, a twitch of muscle and sinew hooked over fibrous bone.
A spasm of life in the barbed tail that caused the whip-like tail to fling itself off the ground like a possessed serpent.
Bits and bobs writhed and crawled blindly on the ground in the crater of gore, save for the upper half of the former owner of the disembodied limbs. The upper torso was composed of a chitinous chest and exoskeleton, though a thin covering of skin and blood vessels covered the armored portions of the steely hued creature. A lone arm was attached to the body, extended forward as the long, phallic shaped head lay on its side, faintly visible eye-sockets staring blankly at the crook of its elbow.
The hand moved slightly.
Then the fingers curled, claws digging furrows into the dirt earth as tissue contracted and was brought into itself.
A gasping shriek erupted from the steely jaws of the dark hued monster, pale green lungs exhaling out a bit of caustic fluid, the green sacks inflating enough that the bottom most portion of them was seen past the torn ends of the upper half.
Pressure built up around the socket of its empty shoulder, the open hole having closed over with a valve-like stump that began to swell and pulse. A familiar sensation was coursing through the dark alien's body.
Pain.
With a shriek something erupted from the socket in a spray of gore and fluids-an arm that ended in a blocky protrusion that flicked about wildly. Smaller phalanges erupted from the end of the extremity, fingers drumming and wiggling.
'Where...where am I? Where is the rest of me?' it thought to itself, hooking its hands into the ground as it dragged itself around the dirt, corpses of humanoids appearing in its murky field of vision. A trail of innards fell out of the back of its open torso, the alien internally wincing at the feeling of its insides picking up dirt and debris as they were dragged behind it like a macabre tail.
More pain began to erupt from its spine and chest, tissue slowly extending past the innards as slick fluids helped to wash off the earth that had begun to cake onto its organs. Muscle, bone and veins began to regrow before coming to a halt-the spine and abdominal region of the monster had regrown, but it was still without legs, leaving it to hobble and crawl helplessly around at the twitching limbs it had lost after its curb-stomp from the metal claw.
The perfect lifeform reduced to looking like a jerky wind-up toy as it continued to haul itself around like a beached seal.
The alien grabbed one of its flailing limbs, sinking its metallic hued teeth into the flesh as it tore away a chunk. Acidic blood sizzled as it poured from the freshly-made wound, more of the fluids dribbling down its chin as it solemnly swallowed the flesh. From the caloric energy came a little more regeneration, the beginnings of its hips and legs regrowing with it.
The creature continued to self-cannibalize on its shed remains, hastening its regeneration as it fed. The taste was foul-but thankly not deadly in of itself, seeing as it was quite literally EATING itself.
Still, it worked-the alien had fully regenerated from its humiliating defeat, slowly standing back up on two legs as it surveyed its surroundings. It saw the cave from which it was born in, and it saw the massive graveyard of dead humanoids. But when it turned its head up to the sky, it saw only the cloudy expanse.
The metal bird was gone.
And the fleshy humanoids with it.
The alien let loose a blood-curdling shriek into the openness, tail flailing behind it as realized what had happened-the humans had managed to oust it and get away. And while it was miraculously alive, it was left on this planet alone.
Abandoned.
And doomed to die.
*
(So! First shot trying something like this-I remember Ridley Scott saying the Covenant Xenomorph could regrow its limbs and stuff, so I began thinking 'Well, what if the original wasn't really dead then?' And then there's the business of one of the Neomorphs NOT getting pumped full of bullet-holes and what happened to it. So I whipped this up-it will more or less revolve around the surviving aliens roaming Planet 4's haunts after the Covenant went back into space. Nothing much, mostly fluff-but I think it'd be fun. Please reply your thoughts and where I oughta take this)
