What occurs when a kind and helpful person is tricked and betrayed by his one and only buddy in the universe? Well, such a person is so filled with rage that his only goal in life is to exact retribution. That is an oversimplified account of Elden, a man-made creation made by the evil Weyland Yutani corporation.
On a moon known as LV 223, Elden received a black goo injection from his friend Francis Lane. Elden then underwent a horrifying transformation that made him not only vicious but also incredibly strong. Elden develops into a powerful, vaguely humanoid beast with unique mutations like jaws protruding from his midsection as a result of the mutation.
He also acquired the capacity to spread infection. We will take a fascinating journey through his life’s narrative and a spectacular conclusion in this video as we examine nine comic issues from the Fire and Stone comic book series. Shall we get started?
Prometheus: Fire and Stone Issue 1
Archaeologist Elizabeth Shaw discovered a star chart in Ridley Scott’s 2012 film Prometheus, and she thought it would help her find the people who created humanity. Weyland included, but we all know how that worked out for her and others who followed her. We see a panel from the year 2090, where a probe lands on the moon LV 223, a barren location with a harsh atmosphere, before the main plot of Prometheus Fire and Stone starts. The probe is quickly crushed under a foot, and aficionados of the Alien series will recognise that this foot belonged to an Engineer, a race of prehistoric creatures who are credited with creating humanity.
Then, we quickly go to the year 2219, as the engine core vehicle Geryon approaches the lifeless moon LV 223. Three distinct ships were being transported by the vehicle: the command ship Helios, commanded by Angela Foster, the patrol ship Perses, and the salvage ship Kadmos.
A documentary filmmaker named Clara Atkinson has just awoken from a two-year cryosleep. Clara logs the activities of the ship, which is essentially on a salvage mission, on a flying Parameter Uplink Spectagraph, or PUPS, an automated, orb-shaped three-dimensional mapping device. Captain Angela believes this would be a high-value assignment for every crew member. “We land, we salvage, we go home, get rich, and eat better food.”
The movie girl introduces the other Helios members while leaving her captain in the care of her substitute swamp grass chicken. In order to “check on Clara’s exquisite body,” Dr. James Weddel got up early, in his own words. Francis Lane, an astrobiologist with Weyland Yutani, was next in line. Weyland Yutani needed an astrobiologist for every trip since it could not afford to miss the chance to learn about extraterrestrial life. But when synthetics and constructions need medical attention, Francis also stepped up as a physician.
Elden was Francis’s most reliable creation, to speak of synthetics. Where did we learn this? Francis, however, told Elden a secret that was meant to remain private. “We don’t talk about your medical condition Francis, not to anyone.” It turns out that Francis was searching desperately for a treatment as his illness continued to get worse by the minute. In fewer than three hours, on January 14, 2219, the touchdown would take place.
We then meet Galgo Helder, the chief security officer. Galgo was a man who loved friendly banter and telling stories, but he was pretty good at his job. Soon, Angela reveals a secret she’s been keeping from everyone. She had told her crew that it was a low-risk high-value salvage mission, but in reality, she was after completing the mission and search what Peter Weyland had started. “He came here on a mission, but he never came back. I want to know why! I want to salvage Weyland’s mission.”
Angela wanted to find Weyland’s truth on LV 223, but not just his truth, and she was after the truth behind humanity. However, upon reaching the moon, the crew was in shock. They had been expecting a desolate and barren moon, but what they found was a freaking jungle, a lush rainforest, bustling with all sorts of alien flora and fauna. They did not have to spend enough time in the jungle before finding the horrors it hid within its depths. The crew comes across a monkey-like creature, a hideous monstrosity that seemed like anything but a cuddly primate from Earth. Realising that the moon was full of life, Francis was informed about it.
However, Angela continued her search for the salvage site. As they moved further inward, more horrors awaited them – a killing field where horrifying creatures had been killed mercilessly. But they had not been eaten, so the killings were made for sport. Meanwhile, Elden and Francis had stumbled upon an entire lake of Black Goo, the very substance that mutated life forms and was used by the Engineers to spread life.
Francis was taken aback by the black goo. “It doesn’t just have a genetic makeup, but it has every genetic makeup. All mixed together. Some I don’t even recognise, but others are very terrestrial. And, it’s aggressive, churning.” Elden wanted to leave the substance alone, but Francis insisted on taking a sample. “You’re smart enough to know I need a miracle. The intensive regrowth possibilities of this liquid are way past stem cell farming.
So, that miracle? Maybe I found it.” Moving forward, the crew comes across a crashed ship. However, it was Hadley’s Hope, the outpost that was supposed to be on LV 426, but the question was, what was Hadley’s Hope doing on LV 223, a sister-moon? To find the answers, Captain Angela decided to unlock one of the doors, but little did she know that a Xenomorph horde was waiting inside, ready to unleash their acidic wrath upon everyone.
Prometheus: Fire and Stone Issue 2
Inside the ship, the crew finds itself in a strange environment. The atmosphere smelled like an ionised fart, as Galgo interjected, while there was some kind of hard, black, moss-like substance covering the walls. The scanners showed that there were alien life forms present on the ship, but before they could go and look for alien life, it presented itself. A Xenomorph latched on to one of the crew members, and a facehugger broke another’s helmet and latched itself on the poor fellow.
Galgo and the others fired at the Xenomorph, but its acidic blood spilt on several humans, grievously injuring them. However, they managed to escape Hadley’s Hope and made their way to safety, but the Xenomorphs were in hot pursuit. Angela called in Traynor and asked for an evac ship, which Traynor immediately dispatched after homing in on Angela’s readings. The crew was in a mess, hunted by alien killing machines on a moon 36 lightyears away from home.
To make things worse, one of them falls off, what appears to be a bridge, and into the water, only to be eaten alive by shark-sized fish. But more men had fallen into the water by now, and Galgo and the others went in to save whoever they could. After a fierce battle between bullets and teeth, the wounded were brought aboard the rescue ship. Meanwhile, Francis and Elden were missing.
Angela then reveals her secret to the crew, but they are clearly not excited about it. And they should feel that way; Angela had practically cheated them. A fight would have broken out, which would not have ended well for Angela, but she’s saved by the news that Elden and Francis had been found. They had managed to find a cave, where someone named Derrick Russell from the Onager mining vessel had been living for a while.
But not only that, this man, Derrick Russell, had left quite an enormous amount of universe-changing notes, and a probe from an earlier crash. It turns out that an Engineer ship had crashed on the moon LV 223, and the crash led to spillage of the black goo, which transformed a barren moon into one full of strange life in just over a century. Angela left with a few others to find and rescue Francis and Elden, but they could not land a ship where the latter were present, so she was on foot. And, not far from there, a panel shows an Engineer lurking in the jungle.
Meanwhile, the Xenomorphs attack Helios and kill two of the crew members. Back in the cave, Francis reassures a scared Elden that they would be rescued soon, but what they don’t notice are three Ovomorphs lying open near them. Knowing that they’d have to leave the cave as soon as Angela arrives, Francis asks Elden to focus on the research. “This man’s writings are revelatory, this could change the universe.” Elden says that it sounds dangerous, but Francis was onto something.
He says that although the black goo acts as an accelerant and leads to heightened aggression and horrific growth, it could be tamed. He says, “Russell was musing about a way to tone down the mutations, to heighten the beneficial aspects.” He was hinting that the mixture of this accelerant, through something like a construct’s engineered blood, would lead to exceptional healing properties.
It could grow limbs and even treat cancer, a disease that was slowly killing Francis. Meanwhile, on the way to Francis and Elden, Angela and Galgo come across an Engineer ship. Galgo reminds Angela that they were out in extremely hostile territory to rescue their colleagues, but Angela shuts him up by telling him how important this salvage could be. Just then, Galgo finds an Engineer weapon. Back at the cave, Francis is about to inject Elden with the black goo. Elden is clearly scared, but Francis tells him that he would only inject a drop, and nothing more.
Clearly, he was a lying piece of shit, because he emptied the entire syringe into Elden, which leads to an immediate and violent mutation in Elden. His veins turn black, and soon, the black goo reaches Elden’s brain. That’s where issue two wraps up, and things don’t look good for Elden. But what will be the fate of Francis? Let’s find out.
Prometheus: Fire and Stone Issue 3
Angela and her team were only ten minutes out, but Elden’s mutation had driven him out of his mind; he had changed… into something smarter and sinister. Francis managed to leave the cave, but Elden was following him. Soon, Elden catches up with Francis, and says, “I was wrong, wrong to be your friend. Wrong to keep your secrets, wrong to trust you. But I feel smarter now; I do. Smart enough to know the truth, smart enough to tell you that, Francis, even in this infinite universe, there’s nowhere to run.”
Back in the jungle, Angela leads the search-and-grab party, but she also carries a canister of the black goo along, apparently because that thing would be more valuable than any of the derelict ships she has found in her entire career. Back at the Helios command ship, six Xenomorphs attack the crew. As soon as she hears the report on her radio, she decides that the new mission objective was saving Helios. Just as they turn around, they get attacked by an alien monkey, which destroys Galgo’s helmet and scars him.
Although he kills the creature with his newly discovered Engineer weapon, the humans learn of a fast-moving humanoid lifeform that was coming their way. However, it was Francis. As soon as Francis tells Angela about what he has done, she has him arrested for violating the code. Francis says, “What? He’s just a construct.” Angela rebukes him and says, “He’s a member of our crew.
He trusted you, and now we can’t. End of story.” Now that Francis was back and Elden had mutated beyond saving, her only mission was getting back on Helios and leaving LV 223. However, the Xenomorphs had to be dealt with before she and her crew could leave. She decided to use a surveyor vehicle as bait to lure the Xenomorphs away from Helios. On their way back, Galgo hears some movement nearby and discovers a towering humanoid figure hard at work. He was making a pile of dead Xenomorphs.
Galgo was smart enough not to engage the Engineer. But upon reaching Helios, the human crew found that it was in much worse shape than they had anticipated. Soon, they find Elden walking toward Helios. He had mutated so drastically and disastrously that he was hardly recognisable. Elden approaches the door of Helios and says to the Xenomorphs, “Are you having trouble with the doors? Here. Let me open this for you.”
And just like that, he opened the gates of hell for the crew of Helios. However, Angela’s plan had partly worked, and Galgo had managed to reach Perses. But Angela did not anticipate the things that were about to happen. Galgo had betrayed her. When she asked for an ETA, he replied, “We’re in flight already, we can see this stretch of LV 223, and those creatures are everywhere. Good luck down there, and goodbye.”
Prometheus: Fire and Stone Issue 4
Issue 4 begins with Elden and his deadly pets entering Helios. Just then an announcement goes off warning the crew members not to engage Elden or the creatures. However, one smartass and reasonably scared crewmember fires at Elden, but to no avail. The Xenomorphs slay him without wasting a moment. The crewmembers had been advised to collect whatever armament they could and rendezvous at the alien crash site. Back in the jungle, Angela and the two others with her look up to her for survival and, possibly, hope. She tells them that they were trained personnel and they’d make it out of the hell hole.
She then contacts Traynor on the engine core vehicle Geryon and asks for an immediate evacuation. Meanwhile, the Helios crewmembers get on buggies and make an escape, as was earlier instructed. However, the Xenomorphs follow and kill several people. Strangely, the Xenomorphs do not follow them inside the Engineer ship, but she cannot rely on this. By now, Galgo and his henchmen had reached Geryon, where they killed Traynor and the others. Galgo was well aware that if Angela got back to Earth, her story would lead him into monumental trouble.
So, he did not want to take that chance. Now, the truth would be whatever he would make it. In the Engineer ship, Angela and the others come across a laboratory of sorts. And James Weddel, the doctor, immediately concludes, “This is an Engineer laboratory; whoever works here, they are not studying life, they are making it, controlling it.” Soon, Angela’s fears come to life, and they get attacked by Xenomorphs.
They massacre all survivors while only Clara and Weddel remain. They had submitted to their fate and expected death. But just then, they get saved by an Engineer who kills the Xenomorphs without breaking a sweat. Honestly, we don’t even know if Engineers sweat. Nevertheless, the couple goes up to the Engineer and thanks him for saving their lives, but little did they know that the Engineer was about to kill them as well.
Elden was still aboard the Helios, and he came across a poster that read, “the universe is infinite; take a friend along.” But this enrages Elden, and he had been betrayed by his friend Francis despite everything Elden had done. Elden angrily tears off the posters, something that startles the Xenomorphs around him. However, he assures them that he was their friend. He then goes on to proclaim that he was not done with Francis. “I have to find Francis, I can still feel that needle, going into my arm.”
Back in the jungle, only Angela and two others had managed to evade all that massacre. She had broadcast their signal to anyone who could find them. For Angela, it was just a waiting game. This was the fourth and final issue of Prometheus, and much like the Ridley Scott films, it ended on a cliffhanger that’s equal parts morose and exciting. Will Angela survive? And will Elden find his old friend Francis?
Alien vs. Predator: Fire and Stone Issue 1
The comic starts with Galgo and his men planning to get into two years of cryosleep on their way back to Earth. After which they would take credit for Galgo’s Engineer weapon and live a wealthy life. However, their plan soon comes to a sorry halt when Elden makes his presence known. The thing is, Galgo had taken Francis captive on Angela’s orders and now Elden was after Francis, which meant, he was after everyone else too. He had taken control of the command ship Helios, which could control Geryon and any other ship connected to Geryon.
Through radio communication, Elden says, “I could shut off your oxygen, I could open all the hatches and crush you like tin cans, I could drown your men in their cryotubes.” Galgo asks Elden what he wants, and Elden replies, “You have the only thing I want – Francis.” Galgo had just betrayed his captain. Naturally, betraying Francis was going to be lesser than a hiccup to him. But Francis was doing his best to convince Galgo not to give him up. He knew full well that Elden would spare no one.
The mutated construct was responsible for several lost lives back on LV 223, and his unstable mind wanted more blood. Naturally so, in one of the panels, Elden speaks to the Xenomorphs and says, “Everyone’s so eager, we’ll all get what we want. Enough blood for everyone.” But all Galgo wanted was to save his life, and knowing that Elden was unstable and in control of the ship, he had no choice but to give Francis up. Meanwhile, Elden ordered his Xenomorphs not to attack until he had what he wanted.
Elden reaches Galgo and Francis, and all that stands between the two parties is a door. Elden says, “Approach the door. Galgo, keep your distance. I haven’t forgotten how dangerous you are. Do not forget how dangerous I am.” However, just as Elden was about to lay his hands on Francis, a breach alarm went off. Elden thought it was one of Galgo’s tricks, but it was not. Something else had gotten inside the ship.
A group of Predators had come aboard Geryon. As it turned out, their unceasing search for deadlier and worthier prey had brought them to Elden’s doorstep. Elden was evolving, everything he touched and everywhere he went, he brought new life with him. And as it happened, he had been injected by something that was as old as eternity, and this ancient substance gave him the power to look beyond the constraints of time. But Predators were here, another ancient force of nature that lived to hunt, and hunted to live.
Meanwhile, the Xenomorphs that Elden had brought with him started massacring anything that moved. Elden was in hot pursuit of his old friend, but Francis was somehow managing to keep himself alive and away from Elden’s deathly clutches. Meanwhile, Galgo had taken Perses and left Geryon, but unbeknownst to him, he had a Predator aboard his ship. Back on Geryon, Elden and his brood of Xenomorphs get surrounded by the Yautjas, who had come for their hunt.
Alien vs. Predator: Fire and Stone Issue 2
One of the Predators shot Elden through and through with a plasma caster. The assault resulted in a massive hole in Elden’s abdomen, but he regenerated almost immediately and without pain. He says, “I don’t know what you are or where you came from, but thank you. I have been harbouring a lot of rage lately. Now I get to let it out.” The Predators flanked him from all sides, sticking their combi sticks in him.
The others battled the Xenomorphs who were protecting Elden. However, one of the Predators grabbed Elden from behind, but strangely enough, Elden’s stomach had transformed into a mouth with several sharp teeth. The mouth bit the predator, and it was something that even Elden had not anticipated. While Elden was battling the Predators, he was still in conversation with Francis about how humanity has only sought one thing– to feel superior. But all that talking did not distract him from showing the Predators what he could do.
I mean, he grabbed one of the Predators by his jaws and opened it entirely with his bare hands. The Predators had indeed found their worthy prey, so worthy that they were dying left, right, and centre. When all but one Predator was left alive, he considered Elden as a warrior worthy of being blooded by Xenomorph blood. However, Elden had moved beyond that. He said to the Predator, “Honouring what you don’t understand. Your rituals. But unlike you, I became alive, I became something else, something better.” And, Elden walked away without hurting the Predator who had just honoured him. Meanwhile, the Predator that Elden had bitten transformed into a monstrosity.
It developed dark eyes and four extra mandibles. Furthermore, it had become cannibalistic, devouring its own. The mutated Predator had become considerably larger and stronger, even by Predator standards. With one single swing of the hand, the mutated abomination severed another Predator’s entire arm.
Elsewhere, Elden was still in pursuit of Francis, who was trying his best to evade Elden’s wrath. But Francis knew that he’d die soon; either his cancer would kill him, or Elden. Stuck between a wall and a hard place, he took the most extreme step and infected himself with the black goo that Elden was leaving behind.
He was right, Elden was the key to his cure and the cure to various diseases. By mixing the accelerant with Elden’s biology, the adverse effects had been subdued. Now, the black goo only enhanced Francis, instead of tearing him apart. Francis could have left the ship, but then he found himself on the wrong end of a Yautja blade. And, on the other hand, the Xenomorphs had turned on Elden, the one who brought them as friends. I guess this guy will die a loner.
Alien vs. Predator: Fire and Stone Issue 3
The Xenomorphs launched a scathing attack on Elden. He had begun to think that they understood him, and that they were friends. But he did not watch any of the Alien movies, did he? These bastards are no one’s friend; all they know is killing others. But Elden was not going to give up that easily, and he was going to put up a fight that was unrepeatable. Meanwhile, the Predator who attacked Francis saw that the man was already dying. And it would have been against the Yautja code of honour to kill a dying prey.
Naturally, the Predator let Francis go, who made his way to the infirmary. Francis had set up booby traps in the infirmary for Elden, who was still fighting the Xenomorphs. It turns out that Francis was rather jealous of Elden… jealous of the fact that Elden lived without any fear of death and how he could live longer. He says to Elden, “I wanted to put a dent in your immortality. I wanted you to be afraid of what’s coming. Like I am.” Meanwhile, Elden fights the Xenomorphs who were charging at him from all corners.
One of the Xenomorphs severed Elden’s fingers, but as was expected, they regenerated. Despite everything that Elden was doing, he was visibly overpowered by the Xenomorphs, until the last standing Predator attacked Elden with his disk. It stuck right into his chest, but Elden saw it as help from the predator. He took the disk and started massacring the Xenomorphs. After returning the disk to the predator, Elden made his way to the infirmary, where he got attacked by other constructs, who were working on Francis’s orders.
They managed to hold Elden in a cage just long enough for Francis to extract Elden’s bodily fluids in a syringe. By now, Elden had given up on his rage and anger against Francis. Francis escaped with the syringe and locked himself in a chamber. Elden says, “Don’t, Francis. It’s not what you think it is. It’s too big for you, it will kill you.” Elden understood that Francis’s human body was not strong enough to bear the consequences of injecting black goo. He was a machine who got life, that was an improvement of sorts.
However, Francis’s sickly human body would fail to bear the side effects. And that’s what happened, Francis mutated into a monstrosity before escaping from the scene. It turned out that Francis’s theory was little less than a catastrophe for him. But to make things worse for Elden, he got attacked by the Predator, who saw Elden for who he really was.
Once again, Elden had failed to be the right judge of character. With grief he says, “He pretended to be my friend to put that poison inside me, you marked me, only to betray me.” Meanwhile, Francis escaped after breaking his chamber, but the mutated Predator, a creature of Elden’s making, arrived at the scene.
Alien vs. Predator: Fire and Stone Issue 4
Elden was seriously confused about how the universe and its denizens worked. All he wanted to know was the reason everything was happening, and why people and aliens did what they did. You see, he had been a construct since always, he never really had any thoughts in his mind. But now, he was alive and conscious, but this was turning out to be more than he could take. On the other hand, the mutated Francis got attacked by the mutated Predator.
But Francis had become much stronger. Meanwhile, Elden and the Predator fight each other with all their might. Francis begins to call it a war, something during the course of which the opposing parties forget what they were fighting for. While Elden uses his sheer brute force and several limbs to fight the Predator, the latter used his weapons. He flings his disks at Elden, who evades them with ease.
However, the Predator sticks his combi stick into Elden’s stomach. But Elden took out the combi stick and was about to kill the Predator, when more Xenomorphs arrived there. But Elden did not kill the Predator, in fact, he helped him fight off the apex killing machines. But Elden was helping the Predator only because he desperately needed a friend. He says, “We are better than this, aren’t we? Let me save you; let me save someone.
Someone to explain, to share with…” But before he could finish his sentence, the Predator attacked him and the Xenomorph that Elden was holding, The Xenomorph evaporated, but its acidic blood made a hole in the ship’s floor, creating an immense pressure difference. After that, Elden went to save Francis from the mutated Predator. Interestingly enough, while he travelled to Francis, he covered a bit of distance in the space’s vacuum.
This was visibly a great feat, because no living body remains intact in a vacuum. Nevertheless, Francis and Elden grab one arm each of the Mutated Predator and sever both his arms. In the end, Francis melts to his death, leaving Elden all alone in this universe. But what’s worse was that Elden was now practically immortal, with no one to talk to. All he had was a piece of advice from Francis, which was to live forever and do something with his immortal life.
Prometheus: Fire and Stone – Omega
The final one-shot issue of the Fire and Stone series begins several months after the events of Prometheus Fire And Stone. By now, Galgo had returned to LV 223 to Captain Angela and her colleagues Jill and Chris. However, they were also accompanied by a Predator named Ahab, who had been on the moon for quite a while. Ahab rose in Yautja ranks to become an Elder. Prior to this, he was a skilled and experienced hunter, who travelled to different worlds and killed and collected many trophies.
In his long and relentless quests, he got many scars on his face. However, after becoming an elder, he became obsessed with finding the race of Engineers. The Predator was inspired by Herman Melville’s 1851 novel Moby Dick. It’s not before long that the crew notices Helios entering LV 223’s atmosphere. But the ship was travelling faster than it should have, ultimately crashlanding nearby.
Angela doused the fire and Elden rose from the wreckage, heavily mutated and probably dying because of the black goo in his body. By now, Elden had become critical and worrisome about matters such as God and soul. He asks Angela if she had a soul, but she says that only gods would know answers to such questions. This piques his curiosity further, and he asks if she believed in God, but she does not really have an answer for him.
I mean, she is not even sure if the Engineers created humans or if it was God. Stuck on LV 223, the humans needed something to create a signal, but they were heavily short on pieces of equipment that could build one. However, while studying Derrick Russell’s notes, Angela learns that Peter Weyland’s ship Prometheus had a human beacon that could be used to signal for help. Angela and Galgo leave for the ship, but Galgo gets ambushed by small aliens. To his surprise, Elden comes to Galgo’s rescue and saves him.
However, the ship had an alien queen inside, who was now trying to free herself. But to everyone’s fortune, Ahab comes just on time to slay not only the Xenomorphs but the Queen as well. Ahab gets up to kill Elden, because he was a twisted form of an Engineer. But upon seeing the mark on Elden’s forehead, Ahab lets Elden live. It turns out that the ship, Onager, was still in working condition.
They use the ship’s drills to make a path, but they are shocked to realise that they had drilled into a massive vein of the tunnel, which was filled with acid. Yes, you heard that right, the mountain itself was alive. Soon, Angela learns that the signal from the beacon on Prometheus was coming from behind a wall. Angela tries to dig the wall, but Elden stops her, claiming that it was alive, and should not be hurt.
As the walls of the living mountain begin to merge, Elden starts to merge with the wall and creates a hole for the humans and Ahab to escape through. So, Elden merges with the mountain, and by extension, the moon itself. It seems that he did not indeed die in the end, but lived on as a part of an entire celestial body that had come to life. He really did listen to the last piece of advice given to him by his friend Francis.