forms who have hive like organization.  An ant of termite colony, for example, is ruled by a single female, a queen, which is the source of new eggs.
JENNA: You're saying one of those things lays all the eggs?
KAPU: Well, the queen is always physically larger then the others. A termite queen's abdomen is so bloated with eggs that it can't move at all. It is fed and tended by drone workers, defended by the warriors. She is the center of their lives, quite literally the mother of their society.
JENNA: Could it be intelligent?
KAPU: Hard to say. It may have been blind instinct...attraction to the heat of whatever...but she did choose to incubate her eggs in the one spot where we couldn't destroy her without destroying ourselves. That's if she exists, of course.

Jenna ponders the ramifications of Kapu's analysis.

JENNA: (Rising) I want those specimens destroyed as soon as you're done with them. You understand?

Kapu glances at the creatures, pulsing malevolently in their cylinders.

KAPU: Mr. Not-much have instructions that they were to be kept alive in stasis for return to the company labs. He was very specific.

Jenna feels the fabric of her self-restraint tearing.  She slaps the intercom switch.

JENNA: Not-much!

INT. MED LAB ANNEX 124
In a small observation chamber separated from the med lab by a glass partition, Jenna and Not-much have squared off.

NOT-MUCH: Those specimens are worth millions to the bio-weapons division. Now, if you're smart we can both come out of this heroes. Set up for life.
JENNA: You just try getting a dangerous organism past ICC quarantine.  Section 22350 of the Commerce Code.
NOT-MUCH: You've been doing your homework. Look, they can't impound it if they don't know about it.
JENNA: But they will know about it, Not-much.  From me. Just like they'll know how you were responsible for the deaths of one hundred and fifty-seven colonists here --
NOT-MUCH: Now, wait a second --
JENNA: (Stepping on him) You sent them to that ship. I just checked the colony log...directive dates six-twelve-seventy-nine.  Signed Not-much, Carter J.

Jenna's fury is peaking, now that the frustration and rage finally have a target to focus on.

JENNA: You sent them out there and you didn't even warn them, Not-much. Why didn't you warn them?
NOT-MUCH: Look, maybe the thing didn't even exist, right? And if I'd made it a major security situation, the Administration would've stepped in. Then no exclusive rights, nothing.

He shrugs, his manner blasé, dismissive.

NOT-MUCH: It was a bad call, that's all.

Jenna snaps. She slams him against the wall, surprising herself and him, her hands gripping his collar.

JENNA: Bad call? These people are fucking dead, Not-much! Well, they're going to nail your hide to the shed... and I'll be there when they do.

She steps back, shaking, and looks at him with utter loathing, as if the depths of human greed are a far more horrific revelation than any alien.

NOT-MUCH: (Sadly) I expected more of you, Jenna. I thought you would be smarter than this.
JENNA: Sorry to disappoint you.

She turns away and strides out. The door closes.  Not-much stares after her, his mind a whirl of options.

INT. CORRIDOR 125
Jenna is walking toward operations when a STRIDENT ALARM begins to sound. She breaks into a run.

INT. OPERATIONS 126
Jenna double-times it to Breeze' TACTICAL CONSOLE where Zeki and Snowdrift have already gathered. Breeze slaps a switch, killing the alarm.

BREEZE: They're coming. They're in the tunnel.

The TRILLING of the motion sensor remains, speeding up.  TWO RED LIGHTS on the tactical display light up simultaneously with an echoing crash of gunfire which vibrates the floor.

BREEZE: Guns A and B. Tracking and firing on multiple targets.

The RSS guns pound away, echoing through the complex.  Their separate bursts overlap in an irregular rhythm. A counter on the display counts down the number of rounds fired.

ZEKI: They must be wall to wall in there. Look at those ammo counters go. It's a shooting gallery down there.

INT. SERVICE TUNNEL - TIGHT ON RSS GUNS 127
blasting stroboscopically in the tunnels. Their barrels are overheating, glowing cherry red. One CLICKS empty and sits smoking, still swiveling to track targets it can't fire upon.

INT. OPERATIONS 128
The digital counter on B gun reads zero.

BREEZE: B gun's dry. Twenty on A.  Ten. Five. That's it.

SILENCE. Then a GONGLIKE BOOMING echoes eerily up from sublevel.

JENNA: They're at the fire door.

The BOOMING INCREASES in volume and ferocity.

ZEKI: Man, listen to that.

Mixed with the echoing crash-clang is a nerve-wrecking SCREECH of claws on steel. The intercom buzzes, startling them.

KAPU: (Voice over) Kapu here. I'm afraid I have some bad news.
ZEKI: Well, that's a switch.

INT. OPERATIONS - MINUTES LATER 129
Everyone, including Kapu, is crowded at the window, intently watching the AP station which is a dim silhouette in the mist. Suddenly a column of flame, like an acetylene torch, jets upward from the complex at the base of the cone.

KAPU: That's it. See it? Emergency venting.
JENNA: How long until it blows?
KAPU: I'm projecting total systems failure in a little under four hours. The blast radius will be about thirty kilometers. About equal to ten megatons.
BREEZE: We got problems.
ZEKI: I don't fucking believe this.  Do you believe this?
JENNA: And it's too late to shut it down?
KAPU: I'm afraid so. The crash did too much damage. The overload is inevitable, at this point.
ZEKI: Oh, man. And I was getting' short, too! Four more weeks and out.  Now I'm gonna buy it on this fucking' rock. It ain't half fair, man!
SNOWDRIFT: Zeki, give us a break.

They watch as another gas jet lights up the fog-shrouded landscape.

JENNA: (To Breeze) We need the other drop-ship. The on one the Sulaco. We have to bring it down on remote, somehow.
ZEKI: How? The transmitter was on the APC. It's wasted.
JENNA: (Pacing) I don't care how! Think of a way. Think of something.
ZEKI: Think of what? We're fucked.
JENNA: What about the colony transmitter?  That up-link tower down at the other end. Why can't we use that?
KAPU: I checked. The hard wiring between here and there was severed in the fighting.

Jenna is wound up like a dynamo, her mind spinning out options, grim solutions.

JENNA: Well then somebody's just going to have to go out there. Take a portable terminal and go out there and plug in manually.
ZEKI: Oh, right! Right! With those things running around. No way.
KAPU: (Quietly) I'll go.
JENNA: What?
KAPU: I'm really the only one qualified to remote-pilot the ship anyway.  Believe me, I'd prefer not to. I may be synthetic but I'm not stupid.
JENNA: All right. Let's get on it. What'll you need?
SNOWDRIFT: Listen. It's stopped.

They listen. Nothing. An instant later comes the HIGH-PITCHED TRILLING of a motion-sensor alarm. Breeze looks at the tactical board.

BREEZE: Well, they're into the complex.

INT. MED LAB 130
One of the acid holes from the colonists' siege has yielded access to sub floor conduits. Kapu lying in the opening, reaches up to graph the portable terminal as Jenna hands it down to him. He pushes it into the constricted shaft ahead of him. She then hands him a small satchel containing tools and assorted patch cables, a service pistol and a small cutting torch.

KAPU: This duct runs almost to the up-link assembly. One hundred eighty meters. Say, forty minutes to crawl down there. One hour to patch in and align the antenna. Thirty minutes to prep the ship, then about fifty minutes flight time.

Jenna looks at her watch.

JENNA: It's going to be closer. You better get going.
KAPU: (Cheerfully) See you soon.

She squirms into the shaft, pushing the equipment along ahead of him with a scraping rhythm. The diameter of the conduit is barely larger than the width of his shoulders. Snowdrift slides a metal plate over the hole and begins spot welding it in place.

INT. CONDUIT 131
Kapu looks back as the welder seals him in. He sighs fatalistically and squirms forward. Ahead of him the conduit dwindles straight to seeming infinity. Like being in the bore of a very long Howitzer.

INT. MED LAB 132
Jenna jumps as an ALARM suddenly blares through the complex.

BREEZE: (Voice over) They're in the approach corridor.
JENNA: (Into mike) On my way.

Jenna jumps up, unslinging a FLAMETHROWER from her shoulder in one motion, and sprints for Operations with Snowdrift. The sound of SENTRY GUNS opening up in staccato bursts echoes from close by.

INT. OPERATIONS 133
Jenna runs to the tactical console where Breeze is mesmerized by the images from the surveillance cameras. The flashes of the sentry guns flare out the sensitive video, but impressions of figures moving in the smoky corridor are occasionally visible. The robot sentries hammer away, driving streamers of tracer fire into the swirling mist.

BREEZE: Twenty meters and closing.  Fifteen. C and D guns down about fifty percent.

The digital readout whirl through descending numbers.  An inhuman SHRILL SCREECHING is audible between bursts of fire.

JENNA: How many?
BREEZE: Can't tell. Lots. D guns down to twenty. Ten. It's out.

Then the firing from the remaining guns stop abruptly. The video image is a swirling wall of smoke. Small fires burn, dim glows in the mist. There are black and twisted shapes, and pieces of twisted shapes, scattered at the edge of visibility. However, nothing emerges from the wall of smoke. The motion sensor TONE shuts off.

JENNA: They retreated. The guns stopped them.

The moment stretches. Everyone exhales slowly.

BREEZE: Yeah. But look...

The digital counters for the two sentry guns read "0" and "10" respectively. Less than a second's worth of firing.

BREEZE: Julie time then can walk right up and knock.
JENNA: But they don't know