Pierce

Captain Pierce
Background information
Appearances	The Thing (2002 game)
Notable facts	Commanding officer, Alpha Team.
Character information
Gender	Male.
Role	Soldier
Group	U.S. Military, Arctic Marines.
Fate	Deceased, suicide (infected by the Thing)

Captain Pierce was a Soldier and the commanding officer of the Arctic Marines' Alpha Team. He was tasked with investigating the Norwegian Outpost. The character appears in the 2002 video-game The Thing.

History

Attempting to discern what happened to Alpha Team, Blake is dropped into the Norwegian Outpost alone and quickly finds Carter and Cruz amid the ruins. Shortly after leaving the main buildings they locate an extremely paranoid Pierce in a supply hut, wielding a flamethrower. Recovering several blood test hypos from a nearby kennel outbuilding, Blake performs blood tests on the squad to calm the agitated man. Cruz is quickly revealed to be an imposter and bloodily transforms before being incinerated — as does the Carter-Thing, who simultaneously reveals itself to the group and is destroyed. Reassured of Blake's humanity, the pair venture out into the snow, only to become separated in a blizzard. After chasing a Norwegian Radio Operator to an outlying group of Norwegian research buildings secretly used by Gen Inc., Blake is briefly reunited with Pierce in the facility's observation tower. However, Pierce is infected and after unsuccessfully attempting to persuade Blake to kill him, he commits suicide.

Trivia

• Pierce belongs to Arctic Marines Alpha Team, yet the embroidered patch on his shoulder spells Beta Team, like Blake's.
• Due to the nature of the mission objectives, Pierce cannot be coerced at first, something shared by Williams.
• Using a cheat to have all weapons and items in order at the start of the level to perform a blood test on Blake will earn the player no trust from Pierce. This can only be accomplished by returning to him with 3 kits, more than 3 will not activate the cutscene where Blake performs the blood test to earn Pierce's trust.
  • At least in the Xbox version, no blood test actually needs to be performed in order to gain Pierce's trust. See Cruz#Trivia.
• There is an Easter egg in the game's audio files involving Pierce. Go to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Computer Artworks\The Thing\data" and open the "mainui.pak" file with WinRar, Winzip or 7-Zip. Now, play the file named "creditsspeech.ogg". You will hear parodies of U.S. Presidents George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton congratulating Blake after the mission, as well as actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and the game's characters Pace and Pierce.

Gallery

Blake calmly confronts a paranoid Pierce, The Thing (2002).

Blake relocates an infected Pierce, The Thing (2002).