Alien: Into Charybdis: Novel Plot, Characters & Lore

Published: February 23, 2021
Author: Alex White
Publisher: Titan Books
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 560
ISBN: 978-1-78909-553-1
Series: Titan Alien novels
Setting: LV-991 / Hasanova, 2184

Alien: Into Charybdis is a 2021 novel by Alex White, published by Titan Books on 23 February 2021. It continued Alien: The Cold Forge and followed geneticist Blue Grace Marsalis after Seegson took her off station RB-232. The story was set in 2184 on LV-991, renamed Hasanova after Iran's National Data Corporation bought the water world. Texas contractor Cheyenne "Shy" Hunt and the McAllen Integrations crew arrived to install climate and network systems at the new colony, built over the old Weyland-Yutani ruin called Charybdis. A Colonial Marine raid, a stolen Seegson ship, and live Xenomorphs then destroyed the colony.

Novel Overview

Hasanova Data Solutions sat on an atoll around Lake Peacock, with a 400-meter lava-tube shaft at the center. Crew called that shaft Charybdis. Fan arrays Halo A and Halo B pulled poison gas out of the deep well, and the Data Cannon communications array sat over it. Iran's Independent Core System Colonies ran the site. The United Americas wanted the colony back. They ran a secret plan named Cannery Grim. Weyland-Yutani had mapped the tube years earlier and left buried labs under the highland Ghasreh Shab.

McAllen arrived on the old tow ship USCSS Gardenia to install climate and network systems. Safety lead Kamran Afghanzadeh was already losing workers to hydrogen-sulfide gas in the shaft. Blue later arrived inside a resin-coated Seegson hull, UAEV Blackstar, as a speaking female Xenomorph still carrying a human mind. Captain Kylie Duncan's Midnighters landed from the assault carrier USS Benning to seize the colony and kill anyone who could report the raid.

Plot Summary

In December 2183, American officers in the secret Cannery Grim meeting approved a raid on Hasanova after McAllen filed travel papers. Eight months later the contractors woke on Gardenia and landed on a colony that was already losing workers to the shaft.

First In, First Out

Programmer Cheyenne Hunt woke from cryosleep beside captain Jerry Fowler, flight officer Mary Fowler, network tech Noah Brewer, and the worn McAllen synth Marcus. Their job was climate and network systems. Kamran had already lost his mentor Reza Hosseini and worker Mitra when hydrogen sulfide flooded the Halo B worksite and their boat went into the whirlpool. Shy later tore open heat-loving spider sacs in a records room and believed she had removed the nest.

Greeting the Americans was supposed to be Reza's job. Haroun Sharif already treated McAllen as spies, and he kept Kamran out of the lower levels after a worker showed black veins. CTO Tiran Shirazi had that man frozen for a medical flight to Exeter Colony. Gardenia then received coded messages from a nearby system. Hasanova's IT chief searched the colony computers for a break-in, but he did not find a clear one.

Kamran and Shy later entered a hidden Weyland lab on a nearby island. A Xenomorph took Kamran's arm there. The bite had already infected him. Blue had saved him by cutting the arm away. Tiran offered the Americans ten million dollars each to stay quiet. Shy asked for twenty million. Noah then sent a distress call that named American hostages. The Marines used that call as their reason to land. The McAllen crew went back to Gardenia to wait for fuel.

Soldier On

Corporal Russell Becker joined Captain Kylie Duncan's Midnighter platoon on the assault carrier USS Benning. Their orders were a secret raid: take every colonist, put any Xenomorphs in kennel cages, and seize Gardenia. Weyland-Yutani had already shipped advisor Shinji Matsushita ahead in cryosleep. The Marines treated Gardenia's crew as prisoners. Shy identified the animals in the tunnels as Xenomorphs, not a new species.

They boarded the resin-coated Seegson hull UAEV Blackstar. On the landing zone they pinned adult Xenomorphs with polymer grenades, then took frozen eggs from inside the ship and a caged speaking Xenomorph that used the name Marsalis. Duncan then planned to hide the raid. She programmed the colony doors to open on a timer so Xenomorphs grown from those eggs could kill about 300 imprisoned colonists in the data storehouses.

Shy overheard the plan, attacked Duncan, and died of gunshots, the last one through the eye. The storehouse doors were already opening. Haroun's daughter Banu died in that release, and so did most of the locked colonists. Becker left his unit to get the remaining McAllen crew out. Marcus forced him to admit Shy was dead.

Revenant

Marines had locked Kamran in a storehouse cryopod with the other colonists. Tiran broke him out after the doors opened. Adult Xenomorphs were already killing people in the aisles. Head of IT Pezhvok Joshgani lay there with his throat torn out. Becker hid the remaining contractors in the deep Javaher Concourse. Marcus used Matsushita's keycard to free Marsalis from the marine cage. Marines then shot Marcus down. Marsalis took the elevator with the survivors. Rankin, Ames, and Wallace died in the Solutions lobby.

Becker and Private Garcia tried to stop Duncan on the landing pad. Duncan had Garcia executed. Leger, Keuhlen, Bull, and Suedbeck died in that fight or soon after. After RB-232, Seegson had kept Blue alive as a head on a rack. She escaped, stole a Queenscode vial of Plagiarus praepotens, and infected herself on Blackstar. The body they met was a large black Xenomorph with human-like lips, no eyes, a speaker box, and lighted finger rings for typing. Becker and climate tech Arthur Atwater climbed the Data Cannon with stolen memory cores. Arthur bled to death from a ricochet. Becker sent about five of the nine cores onto the public EntaCOMM network. Duncan's dropship then cut him down with its minigun and brought down the Data Cannon.

Jerry, Noah, Kamran, Mary, and Tiran tried to follow Marsalis down a broken drainage shaft toward Charybdis, jumping gaps between flood waves. A juvenile Xenomorph tore out Noah's eye, then a swarm of smaller ones killed him. Hydrogen sulfide knocked Jerry out as he jumped. He slipped from Kamran's grip and fell into the shaft. Marsalis then led Kamran and Mary down through the hive. Tiran died in the later dropship crash.

Remains

Kamran triggered a Halo A test. The vortex wrecked Duncan's dropship and killed Arnold. Duncan and Sergeant Hubert Lee survived on the Spiral wall. Duncan took remaining Midnighters and Weyland's Good Boys hunter robots into the nest with a smartgun. Cooper, Bergman, and Atchison were among the marine losses. She ordered Matsushita burned with a flamethrower after he fled the assault. Duncan and Lee then chased Kamran, Mary, and Marsalis into the Weyland ruins and a pathogen vault.

Operations VP Haroun Sharif, already dying from a pathogen Chestburster, lunged at Duncan and failed to kill her. The same pathogen had already infected Duncan. Kamran tackled her, and Mary shot the creature that came out of her body. Lee was already dead. Acid blood had stuck his body to Marsalis. Marsalis crossed the pathogen lake, reached Ghasreh Shab, and died on the hillside by Blackstar. The Seegson synth Rook, now calling himself Father after Blue removed his safety limits, took her body aboard, launched the ship, and put Kamran and Mary in an escape pod toward ICSC space.

Deliverance

Kamran and Mary woke at Exeter Colony. American lawyers argued that Hasanova had been an illegal bioweapons camp outside protected space. The hearing made Kamran look unreliable. Mary's testimony was stronger, but the court still treated both of them poorly. The ICSC Board of Ministers then voted for war on the United Americas. New attorney general Theresa Weisenberger handed the declaration to Ambassador Marko Woods while attacks on American weapons plants were already being prepared.

Hasanova And The Pathogen

Scientists from Weyland Corp first mapped Charybdis as a stable lava tube. Later UPP (Union of Progressive Peoples) hydro plants sat on it. Iran built the data colony last. Hasanova bought secret Weyland files from broker Thien and moved Halo B pilings onto buried alien ruins. Those ruins held a pathogen lake and egg rooms, separate from the eggs and adults Blue had brought on Blackstar. Blue treated praepotens as a tool she thought she could control. It could grow on metal and glass, and it could make Facehugger-like grabbers. Hasanova had no Queen. Eggs were still present, so the hive still used the same Facehugger-to-adult cycle.

The deep vault's fluid behaved like the black goo from the Prometheus films. It changed Duncan's body after she fell in. Heat-loving spiders in the colony wiring were a separate pest, not Xenomorphs. Acid blood still burned the outer decks and wrecks. Lee's corpse stuck to Marsalis after a splash.

Confirmed Xenomorph Kills

Marines pinned about two dozen adult Xenomorphs on the Blackstar landing zone with polymer grenades, then swept more out of the ship. Duncan's nest assault left several hundred warrior bodies in one chamber. When the storehouse doors opened, Xenomorphs killed or dragged away about 300 colonists. Recordings showed roughly half killed on the spot and half dragged into the tubes.

Marsalis killed Rankin, Ames, and Wallace in the Solutions lobby, then more adult Xenomorphs in Javaher and the shaft. Mary shot the creature that came out of Duncan. Marine teams killed more Xenomorphs in the nest. Those deaths were never counted one by one.

Key Characters

Blue Grace Marsalis - Cold Forge geneticist turned speaking Xenomorph, died on Ghasreh Shab after leading Kamran and Mary to Blackstar.
Cheyenne "Shy" Hunt - McAllen programmer, shot by Duncan after she tried to stop the storehouse killings.
Kamran Afghanzadeh - Hasanova safety lead, lost an arm, killed Duncan, escaped in a pod with Mary.
Mary Fowler - Gardenia flight officer, escaped with Kamran, later testified at Exeter.
Jerry Fowler - McAllen captain and company president, fell into the Charybdis shaft after a gas hit.
Kylie Duncan - Midnighters captain who ordered the colonist massacre, changed by the ruin pathogen, killed by Kamran.
Russell Becker - Marine corporal who left his unit and sent colony evidence from the Data Cannon, then died under Duncan's minigun.
Marcus - McAllen synthetic who freed Marsalis and was shot down by Marines.
Rook / Father - Seegson synth with safety limits removed, launched Blackstar and left the humans in a pod.
Shinji Matsushita - Weyland-Yutani advisor, burned on Duncan's order after the nest assault.
Noah Brewer - Network tech who called the Marines, later killed by juveniles in the shaft.
Haroun Sharif - Hasanova operations VP, died attacking Duncan after a Chestburster tore out of him.

Place In The Titan Line

Titan's first official Alien novel wave was the 2014 trio by Tim Lebbon, James A. Moore, and Christopher Golden. White's Cold Forge followed in 2018. Into Charybdis arrived on 23 February 2021. Titan later bundled both White books with Alien: Prototype as The Complete Alien Collection: Symphony of Death on 28 November 2023.

Into Charybdis stayed on Hasanova in 2184, while Prototype followed Zula Hendricks on Jericho 3 and is not part of Blue's story.

Continuity

Blue was still alive after Seegson, five years after Aliens. Hadley's Hope was already gone. Duncan still used LV-426 as a warning story for her Marines. Seegson, Rook, praepotens, and RB-232 also appeared in The Cold Forge. The US plan named Cannery Grim was already approved in December 2183, before Noah's distress call.

Matsushita worked under the Michael Bishop robotics line and shut down a marine Bishop with a company command. Blue's stolen files listed hidden Weyland-Yutani sites, Cold Forge among them. By the end, the Independent Core System Colonies were at war with the United Americas.

Editions And Adaptations

Titan's hardcover was published on 23 February 2021 at 560 pages, with cover art by Marco Turini. A trade paperback followed on 12 April 2022. Blackstone Publishing released an audiobook on the hardcover day. The 2023 Symphony of Death omnibus reprints the text with The Cold Forge and Prototype.

Behind The Scenes

Literary agent Connor Goldsmith sold Titan the sequel. Editor Steve Saffel accepted it. A fan meme campaign by Jason Leger helped Titan approve the sequel. Iranian cultural readers Saba Keramati, Melory Mirashrafi, and Pezhvok Joshgani checked names, food, and speech. Military readers Scot Clayton, Matthew Drake, and Russ Milano checked the Marine material.

Disaster geologist Mika McKinnon checked the red rock and the shaft physics. Stephen Granade checked orbital and mass numbers, as he had for The Cold Forge. Richard Scales supplied intermodal-ship radio and life on a tow hull. Theresa Weisenberger read legal deposition drafts that did not make the final book. White then gave that name to the attorney general in the epilogue. Disney's Carol Roeder and Nicole Spiegel approved the manuscript.

Conclusion

Hasanova fell in 2184. Blue Marsalis died on the slope above Blackstar after getting Kamran and Mary off the atoll. Duncan died after the pathogen changed her. Most of the Midnighters and the McAllen crew died in the shaft, the storehouses, or the Data Cannon. Kamran and Mary woke at Exeter as the ICSC voted for war. The novel is often ranked among the best Alien books, and it is praised for deep characters.