Millard Gagnon: Lodge Scientist Who Made The Necromorph

Full name: Dr. Millard Gagnon
Species: Human
Affiliation: Venture; V-22 Lodge Research and Development
Role: Lead biologist overseeing biological and medical projects
Assistant: Brigette (Venture synthetic)
Known for: Creating and naming the Necromorph
Setting: Jericho 3
First appearance: Alien: Prototype (2019)
Status: Dead; killed himself with a stunner after the Necromorph infected him

Millard Gagnon was a Venture biologist at the V-22 Lodge on Jericho 3 in Tim Waggoner's 2019 novel Alien: Prototype. He studied the Xenomorph egg stolen by the spy Tamar Prather, aided by his synthetic assistant Brigette. By hatching it inside a test volunteer who carried cellular necrosis, he created the creature he named the Necromorph. Its escape caused an outbreak that killed more than a third of the people at the Lodge, and Gagnon died during an attempt to subdue it.

Biography

Venture Biologist At The Lodge

Gagnon had worked for Venture for the better part of a decade and oversaw every project at the Lodge with biological or medical uses. He took a personal hand only in research that interested him, such as a search for a universal vaccine, which director Aleta Fuentes had been reluctant to fund. He did not look like a scientist, being a big, broad-shouldered man with a loud voice and thick black hair and beard. A former lover said his cold brown eyes made her think of a predatory insect, and he took it as a compliment.

Studying The Ovomorph

When Tamar delivered the Ovomorph, Gagnon shelved his vaccine work and kept the egg in a hot, humid testing chamber behind a plasteel window in his Research and Development lab. Needle probes released acidic fluid that ate through nusteel, and a caged mouse made the egg begin to open before it stopped. Gagnon told Aleta Fuentes and Tamar that the egg was looking for a suitable host, possibly a dog, a primate, or a human. He steered Aleta toward using volunteers who signed waivers, and she agreed that legal would do.

The Hassan Bagrov Experiment

His subject was Hassan Bagrov, a Facilities Management technician who had volunteered for paid tests before, including one in which Gagnon infected him with cellular necrosis. When Hassan saw the egg and backed out, Gagnon drove a sedative syringe into his neck and had Brigette catch him. The embryo implanter attached to Hassan, and Gagnon later did a postmortem on it. When the larva burst from his chest, it broke out in lesions and pustules because it had taken on the necrosis still lingering in its host.

The Escape And The Cover-Up

The larva survived the disease, absorbed it into its own genetic makeup, and tore through a vent filter in seconds. Brigette went in after it too late, and Gagnon wondered whether she had let it escape on purpose. Rather than tell Aleta, he sent multi-drones into the ducts and looked forward to the hunt. After the creature killed two dockworkers and then five people at the Mall, Aleta called him a ghoul, warned that she might hand the creature to another biologist, and ordered him to help Brigette and Tamar recapture it.

The Vaccine And The Med Center

Gagnon took a rack of his glowing blue cellular necrosis vaccine, developed through tests on Hassan and other volunteers, and a stunner he had modified with a proton battery for ten times its normal charge. Outside the Med Center he injected Tamar with a modified, faster-acting dose and handed out surgical masks. He had already dosed himself, and Brigette, as a synthetic, did not need protection. Brigette carried a chemical scanner to follow the creature's trail. He walked behind the two women and wished he had a gun, but he still insisted the creature be taken alive.

Death In The Med Center

Seeing the adult Necromorph, Gagnon felt awe and struck Tamar's arm to spoil her shot. Brigette hit the creature in the face with a vaccine sphere, then was smashed aside by its tail while carrying the stunner. At gunpoint from Tamar, Gagnon took the stunner and walked toward the creature, which breathed a black cloud of particles over him. He felt the mutated virus entering through his skin and knew his vaccine would not save him. He pressed the stunner to his own neck and died, his body already showing signs of necrosis, and the creature lost interest in him.

Aftermath

Aleta wrote reports to Venture that made Gagnon primarily responsible for acquiring, creating, and releasing the Xenomorph, while minimizing her own role. After the outbreak, Zula Hendricks and Davis destroyed his research at Brigette's request. Gagnon had never saved it to the Lodge intranet, so they knew they had gotten it all. Davis also deleted the files on Aleta's computers, which held messages about the experiments but no hard data. A fire later broke out in his lab, and its suppression system failed long enough to destroy the egg, the embryo implanter, and Hassan's corpse.

Brigette

Brigette was a Venture synthetic originally built for sex work, repurposed after she broke the arms of a client who tried to cut her with a straight razor. Gagnon treated her as a sophisticated tool and resented her when she spoke up about ethics. She disliked his experiments on test subjects and was reluctant to expose Hassan to the egg. After Gagnon died, her damaged head joined Zula's team, and her ident chip entered the Lodge network to help Davis fight the facility AI. She was destroyed in that struggle, having admitted she helped bring the Necromorph into existence.

Personality

Gagnon saw management types as limited creatures and thought of the egg and the creature as the most beautiful things he had ever seen. He regretted Hassan's death only as a necessary sacrifice for science, and added that the man had not been important. He named the creature the Necromorph after the disease it carried. He also resented being patronized, especially by Brigette. His detachment let him work calmly, but it also led him to underestimate the danger until the moment it killed him.

Behind The Scenes

Gagnon appeared in Alien: Prototype by Tim Waggoner, where his surname appeared 195 times and his assistant Brigette's name 174 times. The novel never stated his age or where he had worked before the Lodge. During the demonstration for Aleta and Tamar, it was Brigette rather than Gagnon who first identified the egg as a biological incubator. His scenes supplied most of what the book revealed about the egg, the embryo implanter, and the way the Necromorph inherited cellular necrosis from its host.

Conclusion

Millard Gagnon was a gifted but detached Venture scientist who saw the stolen egg as the chance of a lifetime. He forced a reluctant volunteer into the chamber, hid the escape from his director, and let a diseased Xenomorph loose on the Lodge. He died by his own hand after the creature he named infected him, and his vaccine proved useless against its mutated disease. His research and samples were destroyed after his death, leaving only Aleta's reports to tell Venture what he had done.