Original Space Jockey Story

leading from

Dan O'Bannon's Original Alien

 

Years later, The Space Jockey's race comes to this planetoid. The Jockey's are on a mission of exploration and archeology and they are fascinated by this marvelous temple and unknown culture. One of them finds the chamber and gets face-hugged. He's rescued, but no one knows what's happened. They take him back to their ship and continue their exploration of the planet's surface. When the "chestburster" erupts from the Jockey it goes on a killing rampage until it is shot and killed. The Alien dies, but immediately decomposes and its acid eats through the hull of the jockey's ship, leaving them stranded on the planet. The Jockeys radio out a message that there is a dangerous parasite on the planet, that nothing can be done to save them in time and that no one should attempt a rescue  .

The message in an unearthly voice spoke words written out phonetically were "Limtis \ limtis \ limtis, r'q'nniblas ai brek ph'nglui zur g'domastion r'zedro veton fhtagn, ai ren, tre horth limts linik cevnologner, suitides, ai thorolast, gles gles gles"."

Source quotes

1. Ron Cobb: Years later, The Space Jockey's race comes to this planetoid. The Jockey's are on a mission of exploration and archeology and they are fascinated by this marvelous temple and unknown culture. One of them finds the chamber and gets face-hugged. He's rescued, but no one knows what's happened. They take him back to their ship and continue their exploration of the planet's surface. When the "chestburster" erupts from the Jockey it goes on a killing rampage until it is shot and killed. The Alien dies, but immediately decomposes and its acid eats through the hull of the jockey's ship, leaving them stranded on the planet. The Jockeys radio out a message that there is a dangerous parasite on the planet, that nothing can be done to save them in time and that no one should attempt a rescue .Then the jockeys slowly starve to death.(Read: Ron Cobb, Alien Portfolio , written and compiled by Jeffrey Walker) .
   
2. "Limtis \ limtis \ limtis, r'q'nniblas ai brek ph'nglui zur g'domastion r'zedro veton fhtagn, ai ren, tre horth limts linik cevnologner, suitides, ai thorolast, gles gles gles (Alien Early version script (online and DVD)
3. Two words recognisable in O"Bannon's alien message are indeed Fhtagn and Ph'nglui can be found in Lovecraft's call of the Cthulhu in the phrase "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn" which translates ("In his house at R'lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming")  O'Bannon was well known as an authority on the work of H.P.Lovecraft, and it is known that Lovecraft's fictional writings that dealt with ancient extra-terrestrial races visiting Earth, "fhtagn" is found to roughly translate as "waits" or "dreams". (thanks to Ribozyme for pointing out where Fhtagn and Ph'nglui can be found in Lovecraft's work)