Fuller got into a bubble suit and entered the Isolation Lab after briefing the Captain. Chandna and Patterson were already prepped and waiting for him. Patterson positioned him near a waiting cart and then she began to make incisions and extract the foreign tissue. The scalpel sank deep into Zhu’s flesh but, because they had so lowered the temperature in the operating room, there was little bleeding.
Chandna assisted in opening up the incisions using tongs. The alien tissue was now red as if it had blood in it. But it also possessed dark streaks all throughout. And it didn’t easily separate from Zhu’s flesh. Patterson had to scrape the edge of the membrane like encasement with her scalpel to cut the binding protein fibers. She said it was a form of scar tissue.
Chandna helped her extract it with tongs. It never moved and seemed little more than a malformed organ. She briskly removed each growth with expert precision. And then the scar tissue too. Chandna monitored his vitals and administered medication to keep him stable.
He received the containers with the alien growths, clumsily arranging them on their cart. Patterson and Chandna continued to administer to Zhu, but they told him to take some tissue samples for analysis and then to store the containers away in cryo. They now had much more tissue (and fresh – unlike the specimens from the derelict) for their tests and could do more work in parallel. But he was sure from what he saw that it was too late for Zhu.
He felt lethargic and sick in his stomach as he slowly pushed the cart into the analysis lab. The typical gore of surgeries didn’t upset him. But seeing the twisted tissue pulled out of Zhu – and the way it bonded with human tissue like it was trying to be that – was revolting. And it was frightening how it was so similar to human tissue so that it thrived in it and yet so different to where it defeated all methods of killing it.
He went down the main corridor and entered Analysis&Imaging. He pushed the cart up to the glovestation to take the tissue samples. Its set of glove seals allowed him to insert his hands and do it manually, but it also had a set of robotic arms equipped on upper rails. He figured using them would be faster.
Opening the station, he neatly arranged the containers inside. He was sweating a lot more than usual, and the moisture was fogging up his suit’s visor. He hadn’t noticed his perspiring until he got in the hazard suit. It blurred his vision, but not significantly. His surroundings felt somehow frightening as he started loading the containers. Almost as if he was being watched.
He paused and looked around. The room was well ordered, same as always. Status indications on control displays were normal. But he felt haunted, and he realized his hands were beginning to shake. And he could feel the sweat within his gloves. He turned back to his work and loaded the remaining containers. His throat burned. Surely it was just upset nerves. Stress.
He sealed the glovebox and walked to the control station. He quickly configured the equipped robotic arms to extract small strips of tissue from each of the masses. These would be sent to small sample stations for chemical analysis, spectroscopy, and microscopy. Patterson had told him specifically to gain several samples from each to see if there was any tissue differentiation happening. The alien organism had to have some reason for dividing itself within Zhu’s body.
He was well familiar with all of the instrumentation and equipment within Sci-Med. It only took a moment to configure the machine to recognize the samples and the operations to be performed. He then stepped back and watched the robots conduct their work, their synchronized, precise movements appearing mesmerizing. The tiny strips of tissue were laid out in petri dishes and passed on to automated analysis. His eyelids grew heavy and he couldn’t focus. Good thing the machine did all the work.
Again and again the robot arms sliced away a small sample for analysis. And when he looked at the bundles of alien tissue now he saw eyes staring back at him. He was being studied too. Patterson came up beside him and watched with her arms folded over her chest, tucking her hands under her lab coat. She glanced at him and asked, “You have the test samples correlated with the alien growths?”
He snapped back to fully awake. The lab station was almost finished with the samples, and he realized that he must have dozed for a moment. “Yeah, I have it set up.”
“Good,” she said. “Come back to operating theatre when all the samples are collected. It will soon be time to join Zhu.”
“Will do,” he said. Join Zhu. The thought gave him goosebumps.
The lab station acquired the last tissue sample and Fuller shut down the sampler system. “TURING, perform the same set of tests as before. Obtain video recording of cellular activity and get a full listing of all metabolites.” Many of the creature’s metabolites should be the same as for human tissue – since it was living inside a human and harvesting its tissue – but unique ones were of prime interest.
“Understood,” TURING said, “commencing the requested tests. I will inform you upon their completion.”
Fuller nodded silently and then turned the lights off as he stepped out. He went down the hall to rejoin Patterson and Chandna in operating theatre. The glovebox was left with the open containers inside. The alien tissue began to move. One by one, the growths slid up the walls of their containers and plopped over the side.
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Holly and most of the crew gathered on the Mess after hearing the first post-surgery report. Zhu was critical and the Sci-Med team were beginning a trial with an optimized variant of the medibots. But their mannerisms proved that it either was not going as well as they had wished or they suspected that it wouldn’t. And Patterson had now plainly stated that there was a possibility that Zhu would die.
Her words hit hard. Nobody touched the coffee and snacks staged around. She thought about having something but decided to wait from fear of shame. She was more tired than hungry anyways. It had been a long day for everybody.
Could it have happened differently? Would she be lying in a cold, sterile room if she had went instead of Zhu? She thought that maybe she would have. She knew she wouldn’t have poked around so eagerly. But she also wasn’t as knowledgeable, nor did she have decades of experience. She looked down at her empty coffee cup, her fingers stroked its cold (like an operating room…or even a dead body) surface. She didn’t want to look at anyone. She didn’t want anyone looking at her.
She was glad to be healthy and safe. But all she could feel was shame. She let Zhu go.
She glanced at Soliman. He had his face buried in his arms, blaming himself. She knew the feeling.
“So, what is that thing that hurt him?” Samoylova asked. “What have they learned about it?”
“You mean Sci-Med?” You know they haven’t had enough time. Surely, it takes months or years to study aliens.
“Yes,” Samoylova said. “Why didn’t we catch it on our sweeps? We’ve got to learn the answer to that because somebody else might run into one of those things.”
Holly didn’t answer. Samoylova was right about that point. And Sci-Med would find the answer in time. She thought they should just wait till then.
She heard Chandna speak. He wasn’t physically with them. He was working with Patterson in Sci-Med but linked in over comms. They were paying for a mistake that she may have caused. That was their job, of course. But it didn’t console her.
“We have expedition samples contained, Captain, and we are hopeful that Zhu experiences a rebound,” Chandna said. “But given our current auxiliary tasks of attempting to verify the spread of the contagion and then sterilizing the Gate, it may be some time before we are able to do the appropriate research to provide a full report on this contagion.”
“I understand,” he said. “Please do what you can.” He looked certain and level-headed. Obviously, he was trying to not degrade morale further by appearing down.
They were all silent for a minute. Holly more and more wanted to fill her coffee mug just to have something to do. Something to stir, something to sip. She thought more about that feeling and realized that what she really wanted was something to focus on, so that she could forget about what she had helped cause.
“What I want to know is…” Moussa said. “How was that thing – whatever it is – how come it was still alive?”
“I don’t have those answers yet,” Chandna said. His voice was calm and expressionless. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s an alien disease,” Garvey said.
“It’s no disease!” Soliman interrupted. “It attacked Zhu. It’s like an animal!”
“We have it contained, whatever it is,” De Silva said. “I want you all to calm your minds. I need you focused on the work ahead. And I need those of you on the boarding team to go back over your video recordings for an event report. Even little details might be helpful for Sci-Med while they try to figure this out.”
The crew gave their affirmation.
“You want to review course change?”
“Yeah,” De Silva said. “One thing first. Moussa, I need you to be ENG now.”
He nodded silently for a moment. “I got it for you, sir.”
“Captain,” Stocky said. “I’d like to go to Sci-Med. I’ve worked with Hazmat for years. I’m comfortable using the suits, I’m qualified for decontamination, and I’m familiar with cleaning up and preparing the labs. Fuller should devote his time fully to supporting research and caring for Zhu.”
That’s why the Company sent you. I’d say it’s foolish if you were human, but you’re not and so you’re probably right.
“Yeah,” De Silva said with a calm nod. “I’m sure they would appreciate it. Moussa, can you pick one other to go with him? The sooner everything outside the Isolab is confirmed sterile the safer we are. Besides, we need to get additional monitoring set up because they’ll have to come down to the lower decks for breaks and support work.”
De Silva seemed to like the idea the more he thought about it judging by how his voice picked up. The crew didn’t seem to. Nobody said anything right away. Moussa gave a heavy sigh and eventually turned to Soliman. “Would you go with him and split the work?”
“I’m on it, boss,” Soliman said.
Moussa gave them a quick admonition to be careful and told them to establish an alternating shift with each other for supporting Sci-Med with cleaning and staging lab materials during the coming weeks. They promised to do so and then left.
Holly could tell Soliman didn’t want to go. But she wasn’t surprised that he didn’t make any fuss. He probably felt like he owed everyone. Also, everyone respected Moussa.
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
She got up and finally poured a cup of coffee while thinking about how to set a routine work plan for the crew over the coming days. Just in case if it was asking too much for Moussa to take over all of the ENG’s work.
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Stocky and Soliman donned full biohazard suits and passed through the airlock to Sci-Med. The common areas were marked with green tags (showing verified clean) as expected. Even still, they had TURING open and close every door along the way. They didn’t touch anything with their gloved hands and only their polymer overshoes contacted surfaces. They passed into the main hall connecting the backrooms. It was also marked green and there were bags of staged material for surveys scattered over it. It looked like they had planned for work but had not commenced.
Soliman held his head down and appeared oblivious. He had not even checked whether Stocky had operated the doors properly. It would take frequent supervision to compel him to work. Humans are so unreliable.
He reasoned that the bottom deck would likely be easy to verify clean. Soliman could take it. He would take deck two where there was greater chance of contamination. And he wouldn’t bother to ask Soliman to help him once he finished this deck. He didn’t really like the idea of doing the great majority of the work, but he wasn’t going to trust the safety of the ship to an unfocused human.
He briefly wondered why he had volunteered. He was the best one for the task. But there was a clear danger to anyone working down here – even one as durable and experienced as himself. But at least he could have confidence in Patterson. And if there was a threat aboard, he would face it with her.
Patterson and Fuller came down the elevator and met them for a quick huddle. Her ample bust made its presence known even in the bubble suit. He wished to breathe in her scent. But he was here to work, and so he tried to push the desire out of his mind. Besides, her aroma always made him tense, and he would do this job better if relaxed.
“I really appreciate you volunteering for this,” Patterson said.
“Anytime,” Soliman said.
Stocky glanced at him in disapproval and then turned back to Patterson. “I would’ve liked to have been down hear sooner.”
“I understand that you have other work to do,” she said.
“What’s the situation?”
“We believe all contaminants are confined to the top deck with maybe some localized contamination of the middle deck,” she said. “Wearing these down here is just a precaution. I don’t believe that there are any airborne contaminants, but with the many travels that we’ve made between decks two and three, we must treat it that way until we know. The ventilation system is split into zones, and so you’ll see regions on both decks which are certainly clean. Keep those spaces isolated.”
“How certain are we that it’s not airborne?” Soliman asked.
“The air sampling system hasn’t picked anything up. Neither have portable samplers. Even the Isolab’s air is clean. But we must make sure. We should be able to make a definitive determination soon, but wear the suits until then.”
“What do you want us to do?”
“Take surface swipes for analysis,” Patterson said. “We’ll use them to further support that nothing is airborne. Then sterilize Sci-Med on a room-by-room basis as a precautionary measure. I’ve prepared bleach and hydrogen peroxide solutions for that work. You can use the EUV drones to help you.”
“Have we tested these solutions?”
“Yes, we have on sample cultures collected,” she said. “The alien cells use phospholipid bilayer membranes just like ours do. We can kill them by the same methods that we kill germs from Earth. The solutions we’ve prepared will oxidize and rupture their cell membranes. The EUV from the drones will do the same.”
Okay, that sounds like it will take just a few hours,” Soliman said. “You make it seem like this isn’t too threatening.”
“Treat this situation properly,” she said in a stern voice. “We can sterilize surfaces quite easily. But we haven’t learned how these diseases bypass attacks within the body. There’s no cure yet. And these alien germs are a wicked family of diseases.”
Stocky nodded. “Let’s start. The ship will be safer once this is done.”
“Great,” Patterson said. “Fuller will guide you to the materials you’ll need. We’ll make regular trips through the spaces to see how you’re doing and to collect the swipes for testing. But call me on comms if you need anything. I don’t expect you to find anything – maybe just a slight spread on the second deck along the route to Imaging. I really value your support, and Zhu will too.” She then turned to leave.
“Follow me,” Fuller said, and he walked toward their staged supplies.
“How do you want to do this?” he asked.
“I’ll work this deck,” Soliman said. “Stocky can work deck two.”
Laziness or cowardice? “Good plan.”
Fuller showed Soliman the working map detailing what still needed to be done on his deck and the staged supplies. Soliman said that he understood his assignment and then Fuller and Stocky left him. Stocky expected it to take a lot longer than it should.
Stocky and Fuller went to the central lift to go to deck two. They closed their eyes and the EUV decontamination system activated automatically and cleaned them while they waited for the elevator. Stocky thought to himself that it may have been a mistake to get himself in a situation where he couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, and couldn’t smell. He wasn’t used to not having his keen senses. When they got to deck two, they passed through decontamination again and Fuller fingered the comms unit inside the transparent pouch on his wrist.
“Turn off your comms real quick,” he said. He had to yell without the comms unit.
Stocky deactivated his comms unit. “What do you want? We shouldn’t drop out of comms.”
“I just want to talk to you in private,” he said. “You have better senses than any of us. You might be able to see and hear things.”
“What things?” And why not use a private channel?
“Zhu brought something back. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not just germs. And it’s not confined on the third deck. Things are fine when I’m up there. But when I come alone down here, I feel it near me. I’m seeing and hearing things that shouldn’t be, and I know that this Traveler intends to kill us.”
The Company should have sent more replicants. “Why didn’t you tell Soliman about this?” He looked all around and saw the same still, calm environment.
“He’s not going to see or hear it.”
You didn’t see or hear anything either. “We can barely hear each other even though we are shouting. You don’t hear much in these suits. You aren’t really hearing – or seeing – things. It’s just your nerves getting to you. Go slow and focus on what’s important. You’ll be alright.”
“No, no. There’s something else in this Gate. But you can spot it. You can spot anything. You go work for a bit, and then you’ll know too.”
“I could open this suit and breathe in the air. And then I’ll smell just about everything on this deck. Of course, you would then have to decontaminate me.”
“No, no decontamination. You die once it gets inside.”
Stocky looked carefully at Fuller. His color was off, beads of sweat covered his face, and his visor was fogged. His pulse was probably through the roof with fright. And it was all in his head. Zhu had merely brought back a disease. But Fuller shouldn’t be allowed to remain alone until he realized that.
“I’ll keep a careful watch. But I can’t do much beside look with my eyes. It’s probably your nerves, but I’ll find out what I can. You need to tell Soliman if you’re certain about this.”
Fuller momentarily glared with angry eyes, but they became fearful eyes once their gazes met. “Alright, I will,” he said. “But he won’t see. We’ll talk again when I next make my rounds. You’ll know then.”
They reactivated comms and continued to the site. Fuller showed him the work map and staged supplies. It didn’t look that difficult. He told Fuller he understood the assignment and then grabbed a few items to begin work.
He looked back and made sure Fuller was gone, and then he set his comms to speak with Patterson directly on a private channel.
“Patterson, come in.”
“I’m here,” she said in a voice which indicated she was annoyed by the distraction. “What is it?”
“I think you need to tour the spaces. Fuller is breaking under stress, having strange thoughts. He’s not fit for a supervisory role. I wouldn’t leave him alone.”
There was a sigh from Patterson and then a long pause. “I’ll take care of it,” she said. “Thanks for letting me know. Do you need anything?”
“Not currently. Over and out.”
Stocky walked to Pharmacy. He thought it best to conduct the work in the spaces furthest from the elevator and work his way inward, towards it. He put the conversation with Fuller out of his mind. He couldn’t trust the humans. He needed to get his job right, and then be ready to do more. At least he had one good splicer.
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Holly had went for private walk with De Silva to discuss their impressions on how the crew were handling the situation with Zhu. She tried to put up a positive face. Everyone was aware that their career was dangerous, and that people did sometimes die in their line of work. She said she didn’t think it would cause an emotional crisis.
But in truth, she didn’t know. She hadn’t been aboard long and she hadn’t seen them stressed often. She hoped that they wouldn’t fall apart so close to Elio space, and she got the impression that the Captain perceived that was what she was doing. He had stated that he didn’t believe they would collapse either, but that they would be on the edge of such a thing – an unstable situation.
Afterwards, they went to the Bridge to review the ship’s status. The latest message from the probes still indicated there were no contacts in Delta Hydri. Their own sensors showed the same thing. They could continue to coast for now, and maybe bring the rest of their salvaged items aboard.
She brought up the idea of redocking the Rangers. She could manage bringing them in even with the debris field. But he wanted to keep them operating around the Nineveh for extra sensory capability. He took her over toward the Nav chart and showed her his plan. They would abandon the craft once they performed their slingshot maneuver to get outbound. And they would act as extra remote probes until the Nineveh jumped to FTL.
The idea conferred a financial penalty. But only a small one. The Rangers were cheap.
She agreed with abandoning them, given their situation, and then they talked for a while about what they would tell the probe. She broached the subject initially and he confirmed that he had been thinking about it too. It was certainly dangerous to anger secret operatives, and so they needed to stress the hazardous nature of the derelict.
A loud beep sounded, indicating a call from Sci-Med.
“This is the Captain,” he answered. “What is it?”
“Who’s with you?” Patterson asked.
“Just Holly. What is it?”
“Zhu has died. I’ll send you my report as soon as possible.”
Holly’s heart sank like a stone and her and her decision to let Zhu again entered her mind. De Silva remained composed, but his voice lowered.
“Understood,” he said. “I’ll inform the general crew. You may tell your team at an opportune time. Over and out.” He looked her in the eyes and she saw the depth of the impact for him too. He was just handling it better.
His eyes pierced her with shame and she wrapped her arms around herself. She wanted to cover herself with something to hide. She had let Zhu go. She knew that he would have likely went even if she had stated a willingness to board the derelict. It probably would have happened exactly the same, and there was comfort in that. But she hadn’t even tried.
He got up and started walking to the elevator. “I must tell the crew. I’ll give you the option to stay here if you want.”
Staying sounded tempting, but she needed to be seen at his side. She went after him, not saying anything. They were both silent the whole way to the Mess. They answered the crew’s usual greeting and she silently sat while he told them. She looked at the table but her mind still conjured up images of the shock and anger in their eyes. Moussa broke the silence, asking, “What do we do?”
She wondered that herself. “What are we going to tell Zhu’s parents?” Your only son is dead, with no descendants.
De Silva broke a long pause from the crew. “I don’t know. With this secrecy…I don’t know. I don’t want to think about it now. I want to clear my head – focus on the outbound. I know that we’ll need to show what he meant to us.”
“It’s probably a good thing to let your thoughts settle,” Chandna said on the monitor. “We can’t tell them anything out here anyways.”
“We’re not going back to the alien ship, are we?” Nieves asked.
Holly looked up at her. She knew the answer was ‘No’ because the Captain would never allow something so reckless. Even still, the question filled her with dread.
De Silva slouched in his seat. “No, we’re not. We got samples, and that should help Sci-Med learn what this thing is. The NAV and I will get the ship on course for our slingshot maneuver and outbound. We’re not hanging around next to a threat that we don’t understand. The cold doesn’t kill it, our medical technology doesn’t kill it…we’ll leave what’s on that ship where it is.
And I’ll set aside a time for a memorial service as soon as I can. But we’ll wait for Sci-Med to stabilize their activities so that some of them can attend.”
“That’s good,” Moussa said. “Don’t worry about Engineering, Captain, I have it.”
He nodded, and most of the crew broke out in whispering side conversation.
Although they seemed more tense than ever, the crew took the news better than she had feared they would. She suspected that those with many years of service like Moussa, Ginting, and Qureshi had seen death before. Samoylova had certainly seen it when she was in the military. But most of them had never seen a fatality among their own.
“You are going to be able to sterilize Sci-Med, right?” Ginting asked.
“We expect to have everything outside of the Isolab verified sterile in the next couple of hours,” Chandna said. “We’re also making good progress on developing medical treatments for the many bacteria-like contagions. It’s tragic that we had so little time to help Zhu. But we’ll have ways to save lives in the future in case others ever come across this.”
“What about that parasite?” Moussa asked.
“That is still enigmatic,” Chandna said. “Obviously, a multicellular organism has far more complexity than something like bacteria. But it also differentiates in unexpected ways. And since there are just the two of us, we have been forced to spend the large majority of our time trying to neutralize the alien microorganisms.”
Several gave Chandna a silent approving nod. They certainly wanted more but knew understanding the alien creature was a long-term research project. Weeks at least. Too long.