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The Necromorph was a lone, mutated Xenomorph that terrorized the V-22 testing facility on Jericho 3. While the breeding of the Xenomorph specimen was intentional by Dr. Gagnon, the necrosis it inherited was not. As a side effect of this disease, it displayed the unique ability to rapidly infect humans with a viral form of cellular necrosis that was carried by its host, Hassan Bagrov. The android Davis One and Zula Hendricks eventually managed to kill the creature, but not before it was able to reproduce.
Characteristics
Other than retaining the basic shape of a human-spawned Xenomorph, the Necromorph was covered in lesions and pustules which could explode and project molecular acid due to its inheritance of cellular necrosis from its host. The raised, irregular black patches that were symptoms of necrosis had combined with its armoured exoskeleton and strengthened it, making the Necromorph especially resistant to weapons fire. Because of its unusual morphology, the creature also suffered from negative effects, such as perpetual pain and torn between two conflicting instincts: one attempting to search for suitable hosts, and the other aiming to spread the fatal disease. This caused it to kill some of its victims while leaving others alive but infected with the disease.
The Necromorph had the ability to spread cellular necrosis virally by extending its inner jaw and expelling a black cloud causing its victims to cough violently and break out in raised black lesions and irregular patches of swollen boils. While cellular necrosis usually would take days to kill a victim, the Necromorph had enhanced its strain to be far faster, able to manifest and induce cough, pain, lesions and paralysis in a victim within seconds of exposure and kill within hours. The Necromorph is discovered to be able to control the severity of the disease, which Gagnon believes could allow for hosts to remain alive long enough to be infected by facehuggers and gestate chestbursters that inherit the necrosis and would grow into more Necromorphs. He also theorises that the Necromorph, once it reaches maturity, could perform Eggmorphing and produce a small number of ovomorphs that would allow for the propagation of the species, each new Necromorph in turn sharing the ability and allowing for a rapid increase in numbers at a geometric rate.
Trivia
- The antagonist monsters from the Dead Space series are called Necromorphs, whether the Necromorph was intentionally named as a reference to this is unknown.
- The Necromorph is notable for its Eggmorphing ability, arguably the only time the process has appeared in official canon. (The canonicity of the Director's Cut of Alien is debatable, while Eggmorphing's only other appearances have been in non-canon video games or unproduced film scripts.)
- However, considering the fact that the Necromorph is a mutant with traits and abilities uncommon to the species, it is unclear if Eggmorphing is an ability shared by all Xenomorphs or merely exclusive to the Necromorph.
- Its appearance is roughly the same as a normal drone, albeit with a green hue. However, this is also debatable, as shown that there's only one picture.