White Spikes are a species of extraterrestrial predators that appeared on Earth in North Russia, during 2048 and wiped out a significant portion of humanity.
The White Spikes are (presumably) an alien bioweapon created by an advanced species capable of interstellar travel, whose ship carrying them crashed on Earth into the Russian tundra in 946 AD, and laid buried underneath the ice for over a thousand years, before emerging in 2048 and within 3 short years, reduced the Human population to a mere 500,000, thanks to their unmatched breeding rate, insatiable hunger and unrelenting aggression, spreading like a plague across the Earth, attacking and killing any and all native life they came across.
A true invasive species, White-Spikes, as their name suggests, are a pale albino-like white color, and are hexapods with six digits consisting of four main legs for locomotion and 2 smaller mantis-like arms for grabbing and holding. They have two eyes located on top and to the side of their head, giving them a wide field of vision, unusual for a carnivore, and are capable of night vision.
They also have a heightened sense of smell, and an extremely powerful wide-opening jaw filled with razor sharp teeth, able to bite a grown man in half and strip flesh from bone with little effort. In addition to this they have two long tentacles, emerging from the rear side and curving forward like a scorpion's tail, with petal-like openings at the ends revealing a hole where they can fire out spiked projectiles made of an organic calcified, boney substance.
They are protected by their dorsal armor, a rock hard covering used to shield them from taking damage, this armor is incredibly tough and even able to deflect direct hits from assault rifle rounds. They will angle their body upwards, putting this armor in the line of fire between their attacker and themselves like a shield. However they do have weak points, namely their face, neck and underbelly, which gunfire will puncture.
The White Spikes are very strong, fast and agile, able to run at high speed and capable of outrunning vehicles, and have been seen overturning Army Humvees and knocking Humans flying like they weigh nothing. White Spikes are very adept at climbing and traversing any terrain, able to even scale vertical surfaces like an insect. Because of their long muscular hind legs, they are able to leap great distances, and possess the ability to glide due to them having membranes between their legs which they can extend and use to jump from a tall object and travel vast distances, very much like a Draco Lizard or a Sugar Glider.
These creatures are also incredibly efficient swimmers, using their legs and tentacles to propel themselves through water at high speed. White Spikes are highly intelligent, capable of not only independent thought among individuals, but they can also predict and counter their enemies' offensive capabilities preemptively and co-ordinate attacks. When attacking enemies, certain males will give others commands and utilize battle tactics such as flanking opponents or prioritizing their attacks on disabling vehicles first.
The White Spikes display sexual dimorphism, similar to hive insects. Males are smaller in size and more numerous, acting as workers and warriors to serve a single female. The female White Spikes are larger and even more powerful than their male counterparts, and are distinguished by red markings on their faces. If in danger, a female will call out, making any males within hearing range immediately come to her aid. They are capable of extremely fast reproduction, quickly overtaking all other sentient forms of life on Earth and destroying them in only a few short years by both outright killing anything they see, and outcompeting them for resources. White Spikes appeared on Earth in 2048 seemingly out of nowhere with no prior warning or clues as to what their origins were.
They first arose from Russia, and spread over every continent on the planet and reduced the Human population to only 500,000. The remaining Human armed forces from every country joined forces and opened a wormhole with a device named the Jump-Link, enabling them to travel back and forth 30 years in the past, where they would draft ordinary people to travel to the future to help bolster their force's manpower and help them fight the invading White Spikes. In order to prevent a paradox, the selection process dictated that only people who would be dead before that year were able to be conscripted, resulting in an army made up of mostly middle-aged people.
Thanks to the efforts of Dan Forester, a teacher and former Green Beret who was conscripted, and Field Commander Colonel Forester, who was Dan's daughter 30 years older, they managed to synthesize a toxin to kill the White Spikes and defeat them once and for all. When Dan is returned to the past, he and a group of others travel to Russia where the ship containing the White Spikes is buried under the ice. They make their way inside the ship, discovering that the White Spikes were nothing more than cargo being delivered by a more advanced humanoid species. It was speculated that the White Spikes could either be used as cattle or a weapon to clear a planet from its inhabitants.
Nearly all the White Spikes were destroyed, except for the Queen and after an intense battle, the female White Spike was given the toxin and killed once and for all and thus saving both the world and humanity from destruction.
Notes
- Director Chris McKay (making his live-action debut on this film) states that he wanted the aliens to "be a character in the movie".
- McKay went on to say "I wanted them to feel old, I wanted them to feel ancient, I wanted a lot of texture. I kept talking about how I wanted history in their [design]". "I wanted to see beyond the edges of the frame as far as what happened to them. I wanted nicks, cuts, scratches, Psoriasis ... I wanted them to feel hungry at all times. That was very informative to the design. I wanted them to feel like they had an insatiable appetite. I wanted them to have teeth that felt like a dental nightmare, and then I wanted them to have a feral intelligence".
- Creature designer Ken Barthelmey states that "the White Spikes had to be a powerful enemy. In our Skype meetings, director Chris McKay described the White Spikes to me as vicious creatures that attack and eat everything they see. He asked for a compelling design that conveyed the hunger and intelligence of these creatures. Additionally, the White Spikes needed to have different abilities such as fast swimming and flying. It was important that they [were] agile and able to move extremely fast. It was my job to translate all this information into one cohesive design".
- Although not confirmed, it is believed that the White Spikes may not be "actual aliens" but genetically engineered monsters created by a much more intelligent alien race with the sole purpose of conquering a planet by killing everything they encounter so an alien race could easily take over.