Sweat slowly dripped down Quex’s face, his beautiful spacesuit now shivering as his finger twitched around the trigger.

Aiming the gun at the robot’s head, the pistol had a long and satisfying hiss of charge. Just before he was about to lay waste to the mechanical creature which stood before him. The end of his barrel heated up, power surging at its tip, for a moment all was still, time slowed and not a single breath was heard. Dragging his sights over the head he pulled down the trigger, however, it was too late.

A split second before he fired the metal being shot out a harsh hand and grasped the commander's arm, crushing it in its cold clutch. Screaming in agony the sound of a bone snapping violently echoed across the room. The bullet from the blaster had ricocheted an inch from its target's vitals. The robot’s magenta eyes stared valiantly at its foe letting the man pathetically squirm and wriggle in its grasp. Releasing the soldier's hand and tossing him across the room, blood flowed across the Kestle uniform dripping down to form a placid pool on the carved floor, the man now decayed to whimper in the corner. Turning to face the hoard of his enemies the creature then spoke a single robotic word, his voice executing an aroma of power.

“Leave”

Seeing their leader defaced of his morals and becoming a whimpering mess in the corner, all of them gathered their supplies, turned and fled. One scientist stopped to wrap his arm around the commander and lead him to safety. Sprinting down the halls they ignored the masterpieces which lined the walls and made way to the opening. In the meantime the robot set to work, furiously bending and repairing the engine with an impassable determination.

Folding the transverter in half he pulled a replacement part from a console and skillfully welded it into the ageless machine. Then he slammed the panel shut and melted the steel around it, sealing it in forever. It then methodically pressed a series of buttons before placing its cold-wired hand upon a lever. With a single uplifting push, the engine soon hummed to life.

The bright purple aroma filled the chamber with light. It then pushed up itself and walked forward to sit down at the main control hub. Typing in a series of commands and operating a sequence of buttons the entire asteroid sprang to life, the distant alarm halted and an ancient beast awoke to thirst upon its enemy.

Dashing down the hallway the last of the Kestle and Aquir bolted through the opening. The blast hole was fixing itself, millions of nanites and robots working together to repair what they had lost. The final Aquir embassy drenched in sweat scurried down the bronze-coloured floors and whipped out his blaster.

Repeatedly blasting the opening to discourage the robots from repair she finally made a leap of faith jumping through a shrinking cavity to land in the arms of her comrades. Now breaking radio contact a barrage of messages flowed however there was no time.

Above in the command deck, the two leaders howled questions at their underlings however none would listen, computers buzzed and burred, alarms burst and screens filled with lines of code.

A layer of confusion and mayhem spread like wildfire through the ranks. Below the ships the team packed up in haste of order, ripping up all scientific instruments; they fled the asteroid soon landing in the safe bays of their origin. The second the landing crafts ascended from the sandy surface, the hole had been sealed entirely, a swarm of repair bots in its vicinity.

The Major stood from his lofty position and gazed upon the hunk of rock, they had just been briefed on what had happened inside. A wounded commander and baffled Aquir stood in the corner awaiting the word of their superiors.

“Send this man to sickbay,” the Aquir leader barked.

She turned to her Kestle counterpart and questioned him.

“How much information did we collect?”

“Around 74 artifacts, 185 photos, two hours of video, eight hundred terabytes of data and a vast number of samples both mineral and biological, not to mention one complete ship,” he replied.

The two smiled at this, as their engines heated up.

“From an analysis standpoint, how much firepower does the asteroid have?” She asked.

“From our new scans this thing seems to be a living fortress, those repair bots and the thickness of the outer layer will result in minor damage to any core systems if both of our ships do a direct assault,” he spoke, his voice quivering.

"So much, why? What do you hide?" she breathed. She stared into the asteroid's hull, repair bots dead in her gaze.

"It can kill us both in an instant" he stated.

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“We have collected enough information, I say we report to our respective high command and make way for the afterparty, our scientific findings will marvel those of our colleagues and successors.”

"Get as many scan readings as possible, we need to understand this better" he muttered.

“Should I return to my ship? and what do we do about your soldier, the wounded one,” she questioned.

“We will decorate him with highest honours, launch a probe to follow the asteroid for as long as possible, now that this is awake it could pose a threat., we can come back with an armada,” he whispered.

"Look at the trajectory, it will be the Collective's problem soon enough"

“I will order my ship to stay with it for as long as possible, we still have thirty seconds before it reaches the nebula, I will go with your ship to deliver the message to command and ensure the artifacts' safety,” she said.

With a wave of her hand, an Aquir soldier carried out the commands of his master, its reptilian skin reflecting in the artificial light.

“Helmsman, take us out, straight for Vala” he barked.

A crewman in front pressed several buttons however nothing happened, the ship simply stood still floating in the void of space.

“Crewman, what is it?” he asked.

“Sir, the controls, they are not responding,” she exclaimed hurriedly attempting to fix the problem with layers of commands.

“Re-enter the command?” he screeched.

“Nothing sir, it seems the vessel, I am currently in remote control, my access is being denied”

“Remote control? Wha…” he exclaimed.

Suddenly another astronaut from behind screamed from his console.

“Sir, the command deck no longer has authority, our power levels are dropping, all system functions are being diverted.”

The entire ship shook with a surge, the lights flickering on and off as a series of master alarms blared across the chamber. The entire crew screamed and hollered problems at the Major, the shop in a state of utter system failure.

“Sir I think the ship is being hacked!” one exclaimed.

“Deploy the firewall, have an emp ready, scramble my access codes, do something!.” he screeched.

Now possessed by another being, all two hundred inhabitants of both the Aquir and Kestle ships were held hostage by an invisible foe, grasped in the unholy clutch of an enemy they could not see, the ship's systems were slowly drained, its immense technological power children play for the scourge of viruses which scoured its many veins. The consoles and computers fought hard to kick back against the enemy but soon the entire ship stood restless, every system had been disabled, all except one, and the entire power of the ship diverted to a corner far from sight.

Sitting in darkness the only lumination coming from a series of viewports which showed the watchful stars of the galaxy, flashlights and computers were taken out, the entire ship now rendered as useless as a floating hunk of metal.

“What happened, is the ship drained of power?” the leader spoke.

“Main consoles and all systems except the engines are offline sir, it seems the vast majority of our power has been diverted to communications and specifically panel c-13.”

“Life support?”

“Backup generators take about an hour to even disable sir, we have time”

“C-13? with that kind of power over the ship, why divert it, why not simply cut it off, where is the panel located?” he declared.

“Directly behind this wall,”

A second soldier pointed to a series of blackened consoles and workstations whose masters stood useless with the failure, waiting for the orders of the Major.

“Quin, Art, Lauo, follow me, give me a hand here,” he instructed

Boots echoing across the marble floor they bend down under the console to a layer of dust surrounding a melted panel.

“It seems to be stuck, I will attempt to force it open”

Standing back he pulled out his pistol and fired four consecutive times at the handle, eventually the metal gave in and the hatch slid open.

Inside was a mess of wires, data chips and devices however one thing caught the eye of its onlookers. A sizable rectangular orange box was jammed among the wires, it seemed to have latched itself into the surrounding tech, pincers and wires spreading into the network of the ship. The box teemed with light, almost as if its internal lights were overloaded with a surge of power.

“I recognize all these parts, but what is this,” he questioned horrified.

The Aquir leader moved over and cast a long glance at the box.

Then his eyes faded over a single logo, a taunting gesture which would haunt many, but also a symbol of power, a picture which spoke volumes on the confidence of its creator.

On the corner was the burning insignia of the Collective blue dawn, and what lay inside the container was without a doubt an information siphoner, the hoard of data collected by the vessel, sent out in untraceable streams of communication. Quite possibly the collective knew about the mission and had planned to gather as much knowledge from the asteroid’s first contact as possible.

“My God, someone quickly destroys it” a soldier spoke.

“Wait... something is wrong” an Aquir shouted.

“What?” the leader replied.

The man paused before mumbling a sentence.

“The ship seems to have hacked the collective box and somehow has reversed its capabilities, instead of sending its reading. The box has tracked down every hidden communications relay and is working backwards, without an emp, the virus is likely to infect the collective homeworld itself,” he whispered.

“What, how would that work? The lag, it would take days if not years to retrieve all of the data,” he questioned.

“It seems to be going at an accelerated rate.” his cadet spoke with excitement.

“Well, what the hell is it doing?”