Is this the solution to the "Mystery of the Sulaco"?

[morgoth0]

Hi All,
   New member here - morgoth0. I used to be a part of AVPOutbreak back in the day but I've been away for quite a while... too long...   I have to say though that it's great to see so many of the people I remember from those days are still around. I hope to be around for a while too so long as you don't mind.

Anywhoo, a few hours after I found this site something came to me that I'd never considered before when discussing the mystery of how the egg arrived on the Sulaco - the egg that gave birth to two face-huggers, heinous allegations about the android Bishop, mysterious reincarnations of Hudson or Burke, Queen teleportation never seen before or Super-Facehuggers and many other weird and wonderful theories 

Back in the day I tried like hell to rationalize the end of Aliens with the beginning of Alien³ and I've seen that others have continued to do so but from what I could see from searches here and on google no one so far has come up with this idea (maybe they did and it was shot down, in which case I apologize for bringing it up again).

Anyway, my theory is that rather than bringing an egg or a couple of facehuggers, rather than an act of treachery from Bishop (which also would have been difficult to accomplish within the timeline), the Queen brought on board a chestburster - the infant form of the Xenomorph... volia:



Note: I want to make it clear that in this explanation I am not relying on an accelerated development rate for the implantation to chest-bursting as in AvP. I suggested explanations for why that could still be considered canon a long time ago and my argument means that the Aliens on LV426 would develop at the same rates as in the original Alien movie. 

The idea of chestbusters being present on LV426 at the time of the destruction of Weyland-Yutani's colony is not out of the question. After all, a live colonist was found by the Marines at the time the chestburster bursted forth. All it would take is one other colonist to have been implanted soon after that one for this theory to not be immediately discounted. That unfortunate colonist would presumably have been further into the nest and not found by the Colonial Marines who were by then otherwise engaged 

Now, we also can assume that any Alien can become a Queen. That question has never really been resolved (but then again the entire lifecycle of the Xenomorph has never really been canonically resolved has it?) but as far as I can see a theory that the Xenomorph will become a Queen if there is no other Queen present fits in the canon. The assumption here is that should no other Queen be present, a Xenomorph will "metamorphosis" into a Queen and thus be able to lay eggs... can you see where I'm going here? 

Okay so here's the only thing you have to assume and accept for this theory to be possible as far as I can see it (and please feel free to shoot it down if you see flaws): that there was a chestburster either in the egg chamber or found by the Queen on her pursuit of Ripley to the freight elevators. The footage of the Queen at the elevator and beyond do not discount this, an immature Xenomorph can be small and would blend in with the Queen's body.

So she grabbed a chestburster - makes more sense than grabbing facehuggers since it would, in a couple of days be pretty capable of both defending/serving her and continuing the line if she should die (by virtue of laying lots of eggs). She then escaped LV426 on the dropship.

On arrival on the Sulaco several things could have happened: (1) she immediately released the chestburster which slithered through a ventilator or access hatch and hid, or it could have remained hidden in the guts of the dropship, emerging during Ripley's battle with the Queen and escaping during the confusion; or (3) it remained hidden in the dropship until everything quitened down. The last is unlikely since I'd assume that Ripley would check the dropship for bugs and the first seems the likeliest since it would have been tough (but not impossible) for the chestburster to avoid being sucked out of the cargo lock.

NOTE: The sound at the end of the movie could have been a chestburster moving rather than a facehugger...

The Xenomorph matures while the remaining crew sleeps. Not knowing what it faces, but knowing that they killed its Queen, the chestburster sets up her egg chamber in a place unlikely to be found - perhaps "a service or maintenance corridor below the main deck, and against the hull" (thanks Deelzelboy) 



After laying eggs plenty of them (in order to ensure that she's prepared for the future), in fact so may that she has to lay eggs on the celling given the small size of the space available, she goes hunting for her prey. Finally finding them in the hypersleep chamber she goes and fetches three facehuggers. This is the only flaw I've seen so far: normally the drones bring eggs to their victims rather than facehuggers. Maybe it's because she's a Queen or maybe it's because the nest hadn't been established throughout the ship yet she behaves differently.

After that things progress as in the opening sequence of Alien³. Ripley is infected, a facehugger travels down with Newt and all seems to be explained... Have I missed anything?  I'm sure I probably have 

Cheers,
Grahame.

[Neltharion]

[deezelboy]

Hi Grahame. Great to see you around again - welcome back!

After laying eggs plenty of them (in order to ensure that she's prepared for the future), in fact so may that she has to lay eggs on the celling given the small size of the space available, she goes hunting for her prey. Finally finding them in the hypersleep chamber she goes and fetches three facehuggers. This is the only flaw I've seen so far: normally the drones bring eggs to their victims rather than facehuggers. Maybe it's because she's a Queen or maybe it's because the nest hadn't been established throughout the ship yet she behaves differently.

A possible solution: in Aliens the Queen is pretty much wired into the Hive - she can't move until Ripley puts holes in her ovipositor, and even then wrenching away from her ovipositor looks kind of painful to her.

So... on the Sulaco she's embedded into the Hive (admittedly it's not much of a Hive at this point, and very cramped). She uses the ovipositor to plant Eggs at any available space, including the ceiling. But she can't move from her original position.

The Eggs hatch on their own, as they detect slight biological activity from the Sulaco's hypersleep chamber. As you say, normally the Aliens take hosts to the Hive, cocoon them, and then bring an Egg to the hosts (as with Newt). But in a case where there's only a Queen, this is clearly impractical. So maybe a fallback option is that if the Eggs can't detect any Alien activity other than the Queen around them, but can also detect faint signs of life in the nearby environment, they open up to allow a facehugger or two to perform some scouting missions. If the facehugger does detect a host, the Hive soon has an Alien who can go looking for Hosts on their own, and the normal activity we see in Aliens resumes.

Any good to you?

[NERMAL]

Welcome back, M. Good to see ya!

And my finger of suspicion still points to Bishop.

"It was with us all the way".

From where? Maybe Ferro did a refuel run and the egg was stashed on board then?

[BlackWatch]

Welcome morgoth0! I don't know you personally, but I know you helped to establish a great fan community that is still alive and strong today, so thank you for that! Enjoy your stay here and I hope you visit often.

"It was with us all the way".

I always thought Bishop was referring to the fact the facehugger followed them down to Fury 161 from the Sulaco in the EEV...?

[morgoth0]

Welcome morgoth0! I don't know you personally, but I know you helped to establish a great fan community that is still alive and strong today, so thank you for that! Enjoy your stay here and I hope you visit often.

Thank you so much but I really don't deserve the credit. Outbreak was online and developed by many others before I got involved posting there (I actually found it via IMdB thanks to Maledoro, cheers man), where I found many kindred spirits, people who to this day I still have very fond memories. I had the opportunity, and honour, to host the site for a while and helped other people develop it into more than just a forum. The merger of sites into this one was the best possible result and, having seen it still online and active now I want to give a shout out to everyone who's kept the flame alive 

Welcome back, M. Good to see ya!

And my finger of suspicion still points to Bishop.

"It was with us all the way".

From where? Maybe Ferro did a refuel run and the egg was stashed on board then?

I always thought Bishop was referring to the fact the facehugger followed them down to Fury 161 from the Sulaco in the EEV...?

Yeah, me too  Unforunately there are still people around (hi Nermal , and thanks for your kind words ) who are biased against artificial beings. Sure the Hyperdyne Systems 120-A/2's were twitchy but who could think the same of the Weyland-Yutani Bishop series which has served the United Systems Military in regular and combat duties  so effectively for decades 

On a more serious note, the argument that Bishop was responsible for the egg on the Sulaco really cannot fit within the timeline. The dropship landed the Marines, they secured the site and found Newt. When Hudson found the location of the colonists Newt hadn't even had time to be cleaned up... then the Marines went to find them (and the dropship would have been kept on planet in order to evacuate anyone who needed it). I'd guess a maximum of 1-1/2 hours between the original insertion and moving on the atmosphere processor and I'd assume that even the worst commander would not have sent the dropship away given that the initial evidence suggested that maybe Ripley hadn't embellished the Nostramo story...

As we all know, the dropship was destroyed as the expedition to the atmosphere processor ended. That would mean that, if Bishop was to be responsible, he would have had to find two eggs, hide them on the dropship and somehow hide them on the Sulaco while dealing with Hicks, Ripley and Newt (I don't buy the whole "a facehugger moved the egg"  or Super-Facehugger things. Nah, the chestburster idea has less inconsistancies than any other explanation that I've seen.

 

Hi Grahame. Great to see you around again - welcome back!

Cheers Deez, good to see you're still around  Thanks for the thoughts. I'm still hung up on how the facehuggers hatched though. The eggs have always seemed to respond to close (non-Xenomorph) biological activity but this time it wouldn't be so. I don't have Aliens available right now (my new copy of Quadrilogy should arrive tomorrow) but were there any open eggs in the Queens chamber - if so it would suggest that this is a possibility?

My thoughts here are that the immature Queen laid smaller eggs (see the picture above from Alien³) and would easily have dropped the ovipositor..? I'd discount the pain problem, after all bees drop half their abdomen and die to sting a threat. But. as you said, she's in a cramped nest and wants to make a proper one. Only way to do that is to infect (and thus remove as a threat) the hibernating crew members, thus she takes the facehuggers to the hypersleep chamber..?

Cheers again,
Grahame.

[SM]

Relies on too many assumptions for mine.

Ripley talks about a single Alien to Bishop and he only refers to a single Alien based on him accessing the flight recorder.

I'm increasingly of the opinion that the start of Alien3 isn't completely literal, but rather fragments of actual events being distorted by the sleeping Ripley's subconscious.