Queen

The Queen as shown in the 1976 board game.
The Queen in Starship Troopers: Invasion
Queen in Roughnecks: Starship Troopers Chronicles

The Queen, also referred to as the Queen Bug, occupies a pivotal position within the leadership caste of the Bugs, serving as a crucial figure in their hierarchical structure.

Starship Troopers novel[]

The Queen of a Bug colony is the progenitor of an Pseudo-Arachnid colony, whose sole function is the production of its members. No Queen has ever been seen by any members of the Terran Federation; though it is thought that they cannot move of their own accord.

History[]

On an unfinished Pseudo-Arachnid advance base of Planet P in Operation Royalty, the Federation's drive to capture the Royalty-class Bugs have resulted in no live Queens captured — all of them chose suicide rather than imprisonment.

During the course of a mission attempting to capture queen and brain bugs, the bugs kill the queens rather than allow her to be captured. Starship Troopers

Starship Troopers film universe[]

The Queen was a closely guarded secret within the Arachnid hierarchy, kept hidden from the Federation. Should her hive come under threat, the Warrior Bugs were instructed to eliminate her to prevent her capture. However, Carl Jenkins and his Elite Guard successfully apprehended the Queen before she could carry out any self-destructive measures. Contrary to initial assessments by Federation High Command and Jenkins himself, who presumed the Queen lacked the intellectual prowess of a Brain Bug, she demonstrated her cunning by orchestrating a massacre of all personnel aboard the John A. Warden, sparing only Jenkins, and commandeering the vessel in preparation for an assault on Earth.^[1]

Starship Troopers: Invasion - "Mobile Infantry"[]

During the Battle of Fort Casey, Major Varro and his team were unaware of the Queen's capture. Following the clearance of a Bug hive, Hero informed his men that Brain Bugs likely eliminated the Queen as their forces approached her chamber. However, unbeknownst to them, the Queen had already been apprehended and was in transit to Earth aboard the John A. Warden. Starship Troopers: Invasion "Mobile Infantry"

Starship Troopers: Invasion[]

A Queen Bug was apprehended at Fort Casey by the K-12 Mobile Infantry team, acting under the directive of General Carl Jenkins, the Minister of Paranormal Warfare. Subsequently, Jenkins assumed control of the John A. Warden from Captain Carmen Ibanez and utilized the vessel to transport the Queen for subsequent research endeavors.

However, complications arose as the Queen exhibited unexpected levels of power. In addition to infiltrating and assaulting Jenkins' consciousness, she mobilized a formidable army of Warrior Bugs, resulting in the demise of the entire crew aboard the John A. Warden. Subsequently, the vessel's power systems were deliberately deactivated, presumably under Jenkins' influence.

Following a collaborative effort involving teams A-01 and K-12, under the leadership of Lieutenant Tony Daugherty and Major Henry Varro respectively, the generator was successfully reactivated aboard the ship. This inadvertently provided the Queen with an opportunity to regain control of the vessel. Subsequently, the Queen initiated the destruction of the Alesia as the Marines prepared to withdraw. Upon seizing command once more, she activated the warp engine, setting a course for Earth to commence an invasion.

As the John A. Warden approached Earth, the Queen systematically obliterated any ships attempting to intercept it. During this critical juncture, A-01 sniper Trig attempted to neutralize the Queen from an air duct. Although his efforts only temporarily disrupted the Queen's control over the ship, it provided a window of opportunity for Ibanez to redirect the ship's course, resulting in a crash-landing on a mountainous terrain instead of the intended target of Paris.

In a subsequent encounter involving Varro, Jenkins, and the Queen, Daugherty's body was employed as a conduit for communication, with demands issued for Jenkins's surrender. Varro urged Jenkins to depart and made an attempt to eliminate the Queen, albeit unsuccessfully. General Rico intervened at a later stage, impaling the Queen before making his escape to the shuttle. Ultimately, the Queen met her demise during the destruction of the John A. Warden, triggered by the detonation of a time bomb on the engine, orchestrated by Mech. Starship Troopers: Invasion

Roughnecks: Starship Troopers Chronicles[]

In terms of appearance, the creature shares some of the elements seen amongst certain types of Bugs such as the Warrior Bug with a large beaked type mouth with a crowned head though its body was much more elongated in order to accommodate its role as a breeder. It has two large limbs that it can use to grasp the ground along with two smaller ones to hold prey as well as six smaller legs to move across its environment. Similar to the Brain Bug, the Queen Bug is quite intelligent and capable of using tactics such as hostage taking in order to protect itself from enemies. Due to its very important role within the Arachnid hives, it is typically very heavily guarded and in locations that are very heavily defended. In fact, it made use of a special type of Royal warrior subspecies known as the Royal Guard Bug.

The Queen Bug is capable of laying up to seventy five eggs per hour with this amounting to one thousand eight hundred eggs per day. This meant that she was noted as being the master of the entirety of the Arachnid race. They lay 54 thousand eggs per month, which shows that they have a very large egg-laying capacity.

History[]

"Since we landed on this rock, I know you troopers have heard the scuttle butt concerning a Queen Bug. I'm here to tell you that... the rumors are true."

—Sky Marshal Sanchez

The existence of the so called Queen Bug was first established during the Klendathu Campaign. Since landing on Klendathu, many within the Mobile Infantry began to hear rumors of a Queen Bug though nothing concrete had been established on its existence. The Roughnecks along with Echo Squad were part of a briefing with Sky Marshal Sanchez, who revealed the nature of the creature to the troopers. After establishing its existence, the Sky Marshal informed them that their mission was to terminate the creature. As a frontal assault would alert too many of the Warrior Bugs, it was decided that two power suit equipped squads would be deployed behind enemy lines to exterminate the Queen Bug.^{[episode needed]}

During the infiltration mission, the Queen commanded some of its forces to capture psychic trooper Carl Jenkins. When the Roughnecks discovered the Queen Bug, trooper Johnny Rico attempted to gun it down but the large creature revealed that it had trooper Jenkins within its hold and used him as a hostage to protect itself from attack. This distraction allowed it to attempt an escape from the Mobile Infantry squads sent to kill it. To preserve itself, the beast quickly fled into a nearby Transport Bug and left Klendathu. Trooper Jenkins later revealed from his encounter with it that the Queen was heading towards Earth.^{[episode needed]}

The Queen's ship was eventually tracked down by the Valley Forge but it was discovered that she had been using a number of decoy ships in order to hide her location. The Roughnecks managed to locate her on a Super Transport Bug where they boarded the ship so that they could plant explosives to destroy both it and the Queen as the living starship entered the Earth star system. The troopers of the squad managed to succeed in their task and destroyed the giant Bug vessel along with the Queen. During the celebrations on Earth, however, Carl Jenkins received a mental imprint that showed the Queen Bug still alive and told Jean Razak that it was somewhere on Earth's surface.^{[episode needed]}

Despite trooper Jenkins findings, many believed that he was mistaken and that the Queen Bug had been killed. This was because there had been no recent Arachnid activity and no other member of Military Intelligence's psychics picked up any activity from the Queen. Thus, the war was considered officially over.^{[episode needed]}

The queen was alive and was planning to assault earth. New bugs who can camouflage into human form are developed by queen and that is how bug activity goes undetected on earth.^{[episode needed]}

Starship Troopers: Terran Ascendancy[]

The entire Arachnids is led by numerous queens, perhaps as “brood leaders”, via telepathy. These queens are depicted as ant-queen-like, immobile creatures of enormous size, hiding deeply beneath the surface of Klendathu and are heavily guarded.

In the final mission, the Mobile Infantry is tasked to eliminate every single queen by planting timed nova bombs around them. In the debriefing, it’s stated when all queens are assassinated, a telepathic surge storms through the hivemind of Arachnids, killing almost every single individual of them and leaving very few survivors wandering purposelessly, which will also be dead soon.

The game’s ending credits shows the charred, skeletal remain of a queen in the crater created by the detonation of multiple nova bombs.

Notes[]

In the cinematic universe, the Queen exhibits the capability to utilize her tentacle for the control or manipulation of machinery.
Director Shinji Aramaki expressed his intent to remain faithful to the original 1959 book with regards to the portrayal of the Queen and the film Starship Troopers: Invasion.
It remains unclear in the film universe whether there exists a singular Queen Bug or multiple ones. The Queen, a species the Arachnids endeavored to conceal from the Federation, suggests the potential existence of multiple Queens dispersed throughout the galaxy, hinted at by Varro's reference to "a Queen at Fort Casey." However, the exact number of extant Queens remains undisclosed.
Furthermore, the precise function of a Queen in the film universe remains ambiguous. While Queens possess the ability to lay eggs for the propagation of Arachnids, it is noted in the first film and certain Dark Horse comics that Warrior Bugs can independently reproduce. The Queen's primary role may lie in the production of more lethal variants such as the Plasma Grenadier Bug and Chaser Bug. Additionally, it is conceivable that Queens play a crucial role in accelerating colony expansion by laying Warrior eggs, thus augmenting the growth rate beyond what Warrior Bugs could achieve autonomously.
In Starship Troopers: Terran Ascendancy, it seems the queens rely on sexual reproduction, since a special "breeder strain" of Arachnids, called “Consorts”, are observed to fight among themselves for “the right to serve the queen”. It’s possible a mechanism to prevent the inbreeding of a brood, by mating a queen with the strongest Consort from a different brood.