Aliens: Lovesick: Plot, Characters & Lore

Published: December 1996
Story: Thierry Gagnon and Richard Forgues
Script: Thierry Gagnon and Randy Stradley
Art: Richard Forgues
Colors: Cary Porter
Lettering: Clem Robins
Title illustration: Richard Forgues with Cary Porter
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Format: One-shot, twenty-six story pages
Setting: The mining complex on RF/C-16

Aliens: Lovesick was a Dark Horse Comics one-shot published in December 1996, with a story by Thierry Gagnon and Richard Forgues and a script by Gagnon and Randy Stradley. Forgues illustrated its twenty-six-page story, with colors by Cary Porter and lettering by Clem Robins. It followed security officer Nancy and her young relative Jimi during a visit to a mining complex, where Dr. Dakien transferred his mind into a Xenomorph after she rejected his advances. The story combined a hostage rescue with the scientist's takeover of the facility's computers.

Plot Summary

A Visit To RF/C-16

Nancy and Jimi travelling with Dr Dakien aboard their shuttle

Jimi travelled to RF/C-16 for a two-week stay with Nancy, his mother's cousin. His parents had agreed to the visit while Nancy accompanied Dr. Dakien to a new mining complex. Dakien ran the facility and wanted to complete its final inspection before the workers arrived. Nancy served as his chief security officer, leaving the three visitors largely alone among the complex's laboratories, vehicles and extraction equipment.

Nancy had to manage Jimi's childish infatuation and Dakien's unwanted advances. She rebuffed both of them and sent Jimi to his quarters to finish his homework. When Dakien tried to touch her, she threatened him with a knife confiscated from the boy. During their arrival, Jimi stole Dakien's security access card, treating the visit as an opportunity for adventure rather than recognizing the danger developing around him.

Dakien's Experiment

Dr Dakien seated inside the apparatus used for his mind upload

Dakien had pursued Nancy for five years and blamed her for rejecting him. After she left with Jimi, he returned to his equipment and prepared a procedure involving a computer upload and a captive Facehugger. His plan went beyond preserving his thoughts electronically: he intended to transfer his mind into the alien organism and confront Nancy in a new body.

The Upload Apparatus enclosed Dakien's head while he authorized the computer to begin. He understood that the procedure would be irreversible but convinced himself that Nancy would regret her refusal after his transformation. The experiment left his human body dead and produced an adult Xenomorph carrying his hostility toward her. His electronic counterpart also gained control over the facility's communications and much of its computer system.

The Mining Pit Trap

Jimi and Dakien standing on an islet surrounded by the mining pit's acid pool

Before his transformation, Dakien offered to show Jimi around the mining complex. Jimi left his homework and followed him through its industrial chambers to an enormous circular pit. A narrow walkway connected the surrounding structure to a rocky islet above a green pool. Dakien identified the machinery beside them as an ore extractor capable of processing three hundred thousand tons of raw earth each day.

Jimi asked whether the operation produced gold or tungsten, but Dakien had brought him there to imprison him. The scientist withdrew the walkway and stranded the boy on the islet. He then revealed that the surrounding liquid was acid rather than water. Unable to swim to safety or reach the perimeter, Jimi became a hostage Dakien could use to draw Nancy into the facility.

The Computer Takeover

The shuttle illuminated inside the mining complex hangar during Dakien's threats

Nancy heard Dakien's announcement over the complex's communications network. He described the end of his human life and claimed to have been reborn twice, first as a computer program and then in another form. His declaration turned from professed love to hatred. When Nancy tried to silence the monitors, he threatened Jimi and told her that the boy was missing from his quarters.

Dakien directed her toward the Laboratory, where she found the entrance locked. Nancy used the overhead ventilation system to get inside, moving through spaces beyond the main corridors. Her search brought her past Dakien's mutilated human remains. His broadcasts continued despite the death of that body, confirming that killing the original scientist had not ended the threat to either her or Jimi.

Dakien's Xenomorph

Nancy facing the transformed Dakien in the laboratory

Inside the Laboratory, Nancy recovered a large energy weapon and accessed the security surveillance system. She had designed its separate camera circuit herself, and Dakien's takeover had not given him control of it. The camera feed revealed Jimi stranded in the mining pit. It also gave her a way to locate the boy without depending entirely on the directions Dakien supplied through the other systems.

Dakien's Xenomorph Body waited above her among the laboratory machinery. Its long tail, elongated head and claws gave him the means to carry out his threats directly. Nancy recognized him as her former employer and answered his intimidation with insults. His human memories and resentment had survived the transfer, and his anger intensified when she continued to reject him.

The Laboratory Fight

Nancy striking Dakien's Xenomorph body with an energy weapon

The Xenomorph descended toward Nancy and threatened to tear out her heart. She stood her ground long enough to fire the energy weapon into its body. The discharge engulfed the creature in a bright glow and left a smoking wound. Dakien recoiled, giving her an opening to break away from the confrontation and continue toward Jimi.

The shot had wounded rather than killed Dakien. His alien body remained capable of pursuit, while his computer counterpart continued addressing Nancy through the complex. She ran out of the laboratory instead of waiting for the creature to recover. Reaching Jimi required crossing the facility and finding a way into the pit without using the walkway Dakien had removed.

Flight To The Mining Pit

The armed yellow aircraft Nancy used to reach the mining pit

Nancy reached a vehicle area containing ground equipment and a yellow armed aircraft. She climbed aboard and took off to reach the trapped boy. Dakien followed her electronically, appearing on the cockpit display and filling its communications feed with mocking laughter. His control of the network allowed him to harass her beyond the laboratory where she had wounded his physical body.

Unable to block the transmission, Nancy used chewing gum as makeshift earplugs and concentrated on flying. She forced the aircraft through the structure and headed for the open mining chamber. The vehicle gave her both a way to approach Jimi from above and weapons powerful enough to challenge the Xenomorph if it reached him first.

The Battle Above The Acid

Nancy banking her aircraft over Jimi and the Xenomorph in the acid pit

Jimi waited alone on the rock as movement disturbed the surrounding pool. A huge, crested Xenomorph rose from the acid directly in front of him, leaving the boy with nowhere to retreat. Nancy arrived overhead and saw the creature approaching her stranded relative. She banked around the pit and positioned the aircraft to attack before it could reach him.

Using the aircraft's Weapons, Nancy fired a sustained barrage into the crested Xenomorph. The gunfire tore through its head and body and stopped its advance on Jimi. Its remains collapsed into the pool beside Jimi's islet. Nancy could then bring the aircraft close enough to attempt a rescue without the alien attacking them at the surface.

Jimi's Rescue

Nancy's aircraft firing into the crested Xenomorph above the acid pit

With the Pit Xenomorph destroyed, Nancy descended from the aircraft on a rope and lifted Jimi off the rock. She held him against her while they hung above the acid and the creature's remains. The rescue removed him from the trap that had made him dependent on Dakien's withdrawn walkway and Nancy's arrival.

Jimi emerged from the pit dizzy and shaken. Nancy attributed his condition to the fumes and took him toward the facility's medical area. The mining complex had survived the confrontation, allowing her to care for him there rather than abandon the planet. The creature's destruction ended the immediate threat to Jimi, but his earlier takeover had also left the computer system in need of repair.

Recovery And Aftermath

Nancy bringing food to Jimi while he recovered and wrote his vacation essay

After the rescue, Nancy received word that a technical team would arrive in two days to reload the erased computer system. The staff had not yet arrived to begin the mining operation, and the damaged network required attention before the facility could return to normal use. Dakien's broadcasts ceased, leaving Nancy and Jimi to recover from his attack.

Jimi returned to the summer-vacation essay he had been assigned before the emergency. Resting in bed with Nancy checking on him, he described the visit as his best vacation. His enthusiasm contrasted with the imprisonment and attempted murders he had survived. Nancy had rescued him, defeated Dakien's alien body and remained responsible for him while they waited for technical help.

Key Characters

Nancy was the mining complex's chief security officer and a cousin of Jimi's mother. Her knowledge of the surveillance system helped her find the boy, and she used both a handheld energy weapon and an armed aircraft against Dakien.
Jimi was a boy spending two weeks with Nancy while she accompanied Dakien on his inspection. His curiosity led him into the mining-pit trap, where he remained stranded until Nancy rescued him.
Dr. Dakien ran the RF/C-16 mining complex. His obsession with Nancy led him to imprison Jimi and transfer his mind into both the computer system and a Xenomorph. Nancy wounded his alien body in the laboratory before escaping to rescue Jimi.

Editions

Aliens: Lovesick was originally published as a single Dark Horse Comics issue in December 1996. Its collected credits separated the story by Thierry Gagnon and Richard Forgues from the script by Gagnon and Randy Stradley. Forgues supplied the art, Cary Porter the colors and Clem Robins the lettering. The omnibus title illustration was credited to Forgues with Porter.

Dark Horse collected the complete story in Aliens Omnibus Volume 5 in 2008. Within that collection, Lovesick followed Aliens: Havoc and preceded the short story Aliens: Lucky. The volume also included Aliens: Alchemy, Aliens: Kidnapped and Aliens: Survival, among other miniseries and shorter stories.

Marvel included Lovesick in Aliens: The Original Years Omnibus Volume 3, published in 2022. The publisher's contents listed it as a complete one-shot alongside earlier Dark Horse material, including Aliens: Mondo Heat and Aliens: Havoc. This later hardcover collection reprinted the same story rather than continuing Nancy and Jimi's visit to RF/C-16.

Behind The Scenes

Lovesick used exaggerated expressions, bright colors and Jimi's school assignment to frame a darkly comic encounter with a Xenomorph. The boy imagined his stay with Nancy as an adventure, while Dakien's supposed devotion became an attempt to imprison and murder them. The ending returned to the vacation essay after Nancy had completed the rescue.

Dakien's Mind Transfer gave the antagonist human memories and a personal motive for pursuing Nancy. His computer presence controlled the complex while his alien body carried out the physical attack. Other Dark Horse stories explored human influence over Xenomorph behaviour through different means, including the trained creatures in Aliens: Music Of The Spears and Lysenko's experiments in Aliens: Havoc. Dakien's procedure depended on laboratory equipment rather than training an existing adult animal.

The Crested Xenomorph that emerged from the mining pit had a much broader head crest than the alien Nancy encountered in the laboratory. The story did not identify it as a Queen or Praetorian or explicitly explain whether it was a second creature. Its appearance therefore did not establish a named caste or a confirmed transformation of Dakien's alien body.

Conclusion

Aliens: Lovesick followed Nancy's effort to rescue Jimi from an obsessive scientist who had turned the mining complex against them. Her security knowledge, the recovered energy weapon and the armed aircraft allowed her to overcome Dakien's control of the facility and destroy the Xenomorph threatening Jimi. The story ended with Jimi recovering and technical help on its way to RF/C-16.