INTRODUCTION
They call me Number 8. Once I had a name: Ellen Ripley. I was the Warrant Officer on a commercial freighter, the Nostromo. We picked up a distress signal from a derelict spacecraft and set down on LV-426, an uncharted planet, to investigate.
One of our crew unwittingly brought back an alien life form that incubated inside a human host. As it changed form, it became a nightmarish creature with concentrated acid for blood, razor-sharp teeth, intelligence, and an insatiable desire to kill. Our crew didn't stand a chance. I alone managed to survive.
My lifeboat drifted through space for 57 years. When I was eventually found, I was brought before a court of inquiry and found unfit to hold a license as a flight officer. No one believed my story about the Alien... At least, not until the Weyland-Yutani Corporation lost contact with a human colony that had been established on LV-426 during my time in suspended animation.
As the only human who had ever seen the creature, I accompanied a squad of space-hardened Colonial Marines aboard the Sulaco. We discovered that the Corporation had deliberately sacrificed the 158 colonists in an attempt to capture the alien species for further study. The rescue mission soon turned into a fight for our own survival. Only three of us escaped before a nuclear explosion destroyed the entire site.
Accounts after that are not quite as clear. Fate, once again, reared its ugly head. I alone survived the crash landing of our escape pod on Fiorina 161, a bleak wasteland inhabited by former inmates of the planet's maximum security prison. Unbeknownst to us, the Alien had managed to plant eggs on our pod, which subsequently hatched and unleashed terror on the prison facility.
It was then, I learned, that I, had been impregnated with an Alien - not just any embryo, either, but a future Queen. I did what I had to do. I had no choice. Before the alien could burst from my body, I voluntarily destroyed it...along with myself. At last, I could rest in peace.
That was 200 years ago. Now I am alive once again, a prisoner on the medical research vessel USM Auriga. Her scientists have spent decades attempting to clone me from DNA samples. After seven failed attempts, they finally succeeded in bringing me back-along with a Queen Alien that they surgically removed from my body.
She has now reached maturity and begun to breed. The scientists weren't able to eliminate all traces of the Alien presence within me. My veins course with acidic blood, I have super-human strength and I feel a strange bond with the creatures, due to genetic cross-mutation.
Am I human, or am I Alien? And what of the rag-tag crew of the Betty, a commercial freighter that recently brought fresh human hosts to the USM Auriga for the alien experiments? They are now trapped here just as I am. Can they be trusted? All I know is that the experiments have gone horribly wrong.
As the fate of the Earth hangs in the balance, I am finally free from my prison. My name is Number 8, and... No... My name is Ellen Ripley, and I am a survivor.
Switches and Controls
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PALM SWITCH: The most widespread type of switches aboard the USM Auriga are activated by detecting the heat pattern of a hand.
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VALVE: These are used to divert hydraulic pressure throughout the USM Auriga. Additionally, some doors are valve-operated.
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LIFT CONSOLE: The consoles are used to activate the network of elevators that connect the various decks of the ship.
NON-HUMAN LIFE FORMS
Due to the Alien outbreak, Father has activated sophisticated counter-measures in an attempt to secure critical areas of the ship and prevent further infestation. If you receive this warning when activating a switch or valve, you will not be able to proceed until all Alien life forms in your immediate vicinity are destroyed (including a Chestburster which has impregnated the player).