THE BEGINNING'S END (Latest revision 09/23/24)

Amber warning lights pulsed in the empty darkness of deep space, and a faint chirping tone joined the lackluster assault on a frigid, vacant bridge. No one heard the alert. The call to action went unheeded by a slumbering crew laying suspended in stasis. The first leg of a long journey neared its conclusion with little fanfare. In the distance, the star system G-633 loomed out of the pitch black void.

A secure server housed in a vacuum sealed compartment deep within the bowels of the ship hummed into action as a multitude of computers, hard-drives, blinking lights breathed life into a lifeless ship. Throughout the frozen spacecraft, an array of long dormant monitors flickered once, twice, three times and then ignited. The bost of glaring screens illuminated dark passageways, empty crew quarters and an unused mess hall waiting patiently for the return of its long absent crew. Somewhere in the Medbay a series of automated subroutines initiated in the auto-doc's mainframe, preparing long rigid bodies for the painful experience of the reawakening.

Three large monitors mounted over large, steel stasis pods cycled through an array absent vital signs. Silent alarms flashed warnings that no human eye saw. The crew was flatline. The temperature in each pod registered, -320 degrees Fahrenheit. Absolute zero. The interiors of the heavy stainless steel pods were colder than the frigid void outside the ship.

Everyone traveling the endless expanse of deep space knew that hyper-sleep was the only way to move through the voids between stars. Time, even time spent at FTL speeds, had a way of slowing to a nightmarish crawl. Sure, at the beginning of a mission there was always plenty to do. Go over the upcoming mission, prepare your equipment, and study your target's habits. But after that, there was nothing but the relentless cycling of digital readouts, marking the passage of time and unending light years. Plenty of time to relent the choice to come out this far.

Soon, days stretch into tortuous months, and even life at FTL speeds becomes a muddy, knee deep slog through the black void swallowing one's weakening mind. That's when the little kid's voice came out to play. Are we there yet? After that... well that's when the unending boredom gives birth to bitter impatience, nearly debilitating frustration and, on and on, until the negative emotions swirled ever downward, and ever darker. One stacking nightmare on top of another until sanity gives way to lunacy.

As a result, after enough time passes to sufficiently twist one's brain pan- the amount of time needed to do that generally varies from person to person- everything starts to go to shit.

At first the loneliness is not too bad. But then, after days or weeks pass, suspicion that things as wrong turn into a gut-wrenching doubt that one has missed or forgotten something crucial. Further worsening the sense of impending doom is a feeling one cannot quite put a finger on what the wrong might be. That bit of unknown flotsam soon erupts into a full on blistering fear that whatever it may be will eventually lead to a self-prophesied mission failure and your own inevitable demise. 

While technology has conquered space travel, it seems it has yet to conquer the effects of boredom on the human psyche. The mind appears to have a limit to what it can withstand. And that limit comes in the form of deep space. Apparently, with no one to talk to and nothing to do but sit and stare at the passing stars, Jack becomes a very crazy boy. Even if Jack brings a few friends, eventually everyone reaches their limits of endurance.

For most, the journey to shit-house crazy takes between six to nine months. But that's if you're awake and totally alone. If you're with a few others the time increases dramatically.. If you're in stasis, it stretches out to more than 56-years. That the longest hyper-sleep cycle ever recorded. In truth, while that person wasn't actually crazy,, she did suffer from a number of debilitating psychological side effects. Most notibly, the inability to come to terms with the death of the family she left behind.

Full on wacko mode may take much more than that, but no one really knows, because no one has ever volunteered to test the theory. Either way, the point is, the psyche eventually cracks and shatters, leaving behind a fragmented and potentially dangerous mind where there was once a healthy one. Not a promising scenario when weighed against the astromical costs of space travel. That's why scientists developed stasis pods for deep space travel.

The ship's auto-doc contained detailed files on how to revive the crew and, as modern ships were now fully automated, there was no longer any reason to use synthetics to oversee the revival process, or monitor a sleeping ship. That had been common practice 190 years earlier when Waylan Yutani's Mega factories criss/crossed the cosmos plundering resources wherever they could find them. Back then, when a ship embarked on a long range journey, the synthetic passenger placed their crews into stasis pods, managed the vessel's functions in transit and then woke the sleeping crew when the ship arrived at its final destination. Sounds easy, right? It was supposed to be, but there were unforeseen bumps.

Unfortunately, for some crews, no one considered the long-term psycological effects of isolation on synthetic possesses. The oversight resulted in a number of spectacular and highly publicized mission failures. In all cases, those failures led to losses in the billions, complete mission failures, loss of payloads and the crews. Many believed Waylan Yutani covered up many of the incidents.

After those highly publicized cases, the company automated their ships and hyper-sleep cycles, allowing the discontinuation of synthetic ride alongs. No loss of longterm profits though. Stockholders fear not. Waylan Yutani still had their N6 replicants to fall back on. What could go wrong there?

As the liquid nitrogen drained from icy pods, thick vapors faded away and sub zero temperatures rose slowly, revealing the blotchy pallid faces of two men and one young woman, the auto doc had its marching orders. And so it went about performing its assigned tasks with a methodical precision no human could possibly hope to match. It would wake the sleeping crew, get them up on their feet and back on task. Of course the auto doc had no way of predicting how entering the forbidden planets region would affect the crew's mental states. That would be determined during days ahead.

50 years earlier, when MegaCorp- a wholly owned subsidiary of Waylan Yutani- first sent its long range haulers out this far, ship captains reported an unprecedented rise in violent incidents in the region. Extreme paranoia and aberrant behaviors became prevalent in the usually docile crews. At the same time, other ships traversing the area reported crew members coming out of stasis, were experiencing traumatic hallucinations that lead to unpredictable behavioral abnormalities and, in extreme cases, dissociative madness and, finally, death.

No one knew why their crews were affected by the region and thus, the sector was quarantined. From that point forward, most captains steered away from the forbidden planets region. Some, more daring crews, did not.

Three green dots raced successively across the medbay monitors from left to right. Above one of the monitors, a readout flashed, 'POD 3: Dahlia, "Dahl," Johns, STORAGE DURATION… WARNING…. CRITICAL LIFESIGNS FAILURE. TIME ELAPSED… UNKNOWN.'

One of the flat lines spiked and a nearby speaker beeped faintly as a long dormant heart spasmed. A second line blipped and then the third. Increasingly larger spikes raced by. Louder beeps sounded out. Eventually, the numbers filling the screens climbed steadily, blood chemistries improved, respirations evened out and 02 stats climbed to 98 percent.

In the lower right-hand corner of the auto doc's monitor, a ¼ sized pop-up screen flashed an angry red border. It had picked up a foreign object in pod 2.

WARNING! The tiny screen flashed repeatedly. Then, DANGER! On the second flash, every light throughout the ship turned from a sterile white to a pulsating, angry amber, and then, emergency beacons all over the ship dropped from every ceiling, flashing a staccato crimson. Shrill alarms shattered the quiet as the last of the darkness disappeared, replaced by a frantic warning no one saw or heard.

The pre-programmed response - no more or less a priority to the empty ship than any of the other tens of thousands of subroutines stored in the ship's database - went unheeded by the still sleeping crew.

"ATTENTION!" a synthetic voice blared over the speaker system. "UNKNOWN BIOLOGIC DETECTED IN POD 2. ALL PERSONNEL PROCEED TO THE NEAREST QUARANTINE AREA. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. ALL PERSONNEL PROCEED TO THE NEAREST QUARANTINE AREA."

The sound of hydraulic pistons whining into action filled the cold air, and a series of electromagnets in the bottom of the three pods lifted them a fraction of an inch above the floor. Pod 2 lurched forward as if dragged along by an invisible force. It moved out over the red painted track leading to the quarantine area.

Then pod 1 moved out, stopping inches behind it, followed by Pod 3, stopping inches behind pod 1.

A series of spinning strobe lights lead the procession towards the rear of the compartment. Pod 2 stopped in a small alcove and a heavy steel bulkhead with a large window inset into the center of its frame descended from the ceiling. A hissing thud filled the bay as the bulkhead sealed the chamber away from the rest of the ship. A moment later, both pods 1 and 3 had followed suit. With loud thuds and ear-splitting hisses, the auto doc sealed the remaining pods away.

Outside medbay, an array of environmental controls began the arduous process of removing unwanted ice crystals from every circuit board on the ship. During silent running, environmental conditions had plummeted to temperatures of the void outside. Water vapor in the once warm moist air had condensed and crystallized on every surface, and now the returning heat had become the enemy. Like the ship's fragile crew, the delicate electronics needed to be warmed slowly or many of its systems would fail. If the ship's internal temperature rose too quickly, the water droplets left by melting frost could gather into puddles and short circuit many of the ship's delicate systems. Systems, that if compromised, would lead to a slow and painful demise for all aboard.

Inside the pods, a host of whirring machines drew harsh chemicals from icy cells, while still others, pushed vital fluids back into slowly warming bodies. The process of reanimation had begun and with it, mobility returned to the immobile. Hearts beat. Warning juices ebbed through long unused circulatory and digestive systems. Neural pathways sparked to life once more and the mind's eye cracked open, albeit misfiring, as the angry, flashing world outside came rampaging back into focus.

This sucks, Dahl thought, almost frightened by the sound of her own voice echoing around inside her head. It feels like I've been down for a lifetime.

Dahl knew hyper-sleep journeys typically lasted no more than 6 months. Hell, everyone knew that. Any longer than that and the body started to lose body mass. After a few years, the body, now devoid of body fat, began using proteins as fuel. That's when body mass dropped drastically. Every cell in Dahl's body cried out in pain. Bloody tears trickled down the sides of her sunken face. Whatever this pain was, it didn't feel like coming out of hyper-sleep.

Why do I feel like shit? she thought. I hurt all over.

Everything was fuzzy in her mind. She thought she had signed a standard guild contract. Or had she? The terms were simple: 3 to 6 months out in stasis, mission task complete and then 3 to 6 month return flight back in stasis. After which, she would receive 1 year's pay and a mission bonus of 15 - 20%, at the time of mission debrief.

She remembered going to the docks, the way she always did before Lockspur and Moss boarded the ship to take off. But this time something was different. She always asked if she could go. It had become a tradition. But this time, dock security had met her outside the ship and taken her to a guild debrief room out back.

Lady Hemmingford , their employer, entered the room as if she ran the Guild docks. No, like she owned the Guild docks. But that was nothing new. As Lilith Hemmingford looked around the cramped room, Dahl noticed the red light on the camera hanging in the upper corner of the room go out. Lilith has pull, Dahl thought, right eyebrow raising slightly. 'She had the camera turned off.'

The tall, dark-haired woman wore an haute practiced smile of nobility that made Dahl slightly envious. She knew her well. Lilith surveyed Dahl's mission ready attire with a blithe interest and said, "Your Uncle John tells me you want to join the crew. He says you ask every time they go out."

"I do." Dahl replied, suddenly feeling a little childish. 

"He says he and the others have spent years training you. Is that correct?"

Dahl nodded, struggling to keep eye contact. 

Lady Hemmingford leaned over the table and asked, "Are you ready? Really, ready."

"Absolutely!" Dahl said, "I'm ready."

"Good." Lilith said, sneaking a peek at the camera to make sure the light was still off. "Regrettably, your uncle won't be accompanying you on your first mission. I have a job that requires his personal attention. As such, I find myself in need of a suitable replacement I can trust in his stead. He assures me, you are that replacement."

"I won't let you down."

"No. You won't." Lilith replied.

Lilith wore a gown fit for a dark queen. Dahl saw the telltale signs of a tactical stealth suit carefully concealed beneath the expensive fabric. Lilith had power. But Dahl knew she also had enemies, and Lilith always prepared for unforeseen trouble. Why else don mercenary attire? Dahl looked her up and down, wondering what weapons she had concealed beneath her gown. Not that she needed a weapon. Lady Hemmingford was lethal at any range. More so, up close.

Dahl thought the black gown Lilith wore was nothing a true noble would wear. The material looked like glistening black onyx. It looked almost alive. Like shimmering black scales. It was beautiful, and Dahl had no idea what the dress was really made of. Dahl looked at the blind camera and thought, this isn't exactly public. It's where all the dirty little deals come to life. In rooms like this, nobles like Lilith can do not as they pretend, but as they please. But this woman carried herself with a demeanor that said, I do as I please, whenever I please. And Dahl wanted to be just like her.

Lilith held up a paper and read, "Miss Dahlia Johns, chief navigator, co- pilot, part-time mechanic, specialist in hand to hand, edged weapons, long-range weapons and…" Lilith paused long enough to take Dahl in before adding, "Your Uncle added... attitude."

She smiled and said, "He would. And thanks for giving me this chance."

"On the contrary, my dear. Thank you for preparing yourself so admirably for service and welcome to crew 1. I sincerely hope you never come to regret your decision to join our merry little band."

Dahl looked out through the foggy viewport, saw the sterile white walls with their single wide red band running around at just above waist high and knew the color red signifies something bad had happened. "What's goin' on?" she said, daisedly. She fought back a rasping cough, realizing the pain it would undoubtedly bring.

She stared up at a ceiling covered in an array of snaking pipes and glimpsed yellow strobes outside the containment barrier. Then she said, "This is quarantine. We're in lockdown.''

Dahl's eyelids burst open as she spied an opaque fluid flowing up the long clear surgical tubing, disappearing down her right nostril. She tried to grab the tube and stop its progress, but her hands refused the command. She watched in growing terror as the fluid neared its target. Her stomach cramped as the warming solution of electrolytes and glucose spilled out the open end, filling her shrunken belly with a rejuvenating serum. Dahl knew it would help her recover, but right now it only made her want to puke. A sudden glut of tenacious spit filled the back of her sandpaper throat. The choking mass only increased the nauseating urge to wretch. Spasms tore through her belly. She wanted to cry out, but nothing worked. Mercifully, nothing came up. That wasnt working yet, either. Nothing was in her long empty stomach to come up.

Outside Dahl's claustrophobic pod, rigid bodies warmed, stiff arms convulsed painfully and yawning mouths gulped at the icy air. The frigid air burning unused lungs. Hacking coughs filled the silence as dry lungs opened and closed like wheezing bellows. The effort of breathing brought about sharp stabbing pains that pierced heaving chest cavities and exploded out the back of aching rib cages.

Moss' head pounded as if a blunted jackhammer beat against a thick concrete skull and the shards of spiralling dizziness made him feel as though he were about to shit his pod. The sudden unappreciated stench of warming bowels filled the confined space and shaky fists clumsily banged against the inside of the heavy lid. 'Open for fuck' sake,' he thought, trying to force the stasis lid up before the reanimation process had completed. "Come on," he rasped, his voice sounding as if sandpaper lined his windpipe. But try as he might, nothing happened. The heavy lid stayed closed. He would have to wait. His imprisonment was one part atrophy and one part thick metal locks. There would be no speedy escape.

Lockspur heard his comrade's commotion, pressed his communications button and said, "Calm down." He reached up with his other hand, massaging the sore flesh around his knotted throat. "There's nothing wrong. It's just a stupid mistake." But he knew that wasn't true. He had an unauthorized device implanted in his right lower forearm. It was supposed to be cloaked to hide it from computerized detection, but the auto-doc must have picked it up and sent them into quarantine to check it out. That was shit luck. But that was not a problem., because Lady Hemmingford assured him it would remain hidden until he needed it.

"Christ, it hurts to talk." Dahl said to herself. "It feels like some asshole jammed a goddamn wire bore cleaning brush down my throat." Her body convulsed into a fit of uncontrolled shivering and her teeth chattered so violently, she thought they were going to shatter. "Turn the fucking heat on." she demanded, weakly pushing up on her own lid. Nothing happened. The lock would not give and even if she could get the lid open. There wasn't enough room between the outer edge of the pod and the wall of her containment cell for her to stand up or even get out. Like the others, Dahl would have to remain there until the auto doc cleared them from quarantine. 'And God only knows how long I'll be here.' she thought, trembling hands running along her body as if searching for an answer to why she was in quarantine.

"Gotta… get out." Moss said, weakly hitting the lid as the taste of syrupy bile filled his mouth. The concoction pouring into his shrunken belly was doing its job. His face had turned back to normal as blood flow returned to his recently ashen features. Pores opened, sweat flowed and another layer of stench twisted his already aching guts. If the pod stank any worse, he would surely blow.

A grating cough came from the back of a dry throat in pod 2. The solution pouring into the dark-skinned man's slowly warming stomach did little to ease a growing desire for a drink of cool water or the sudden need to get away from the stench filling his own pod. "Not gonna happen." Carlos Lockspur said, trying unsuccessfully to force the lid up as a wave of escaping gas made him cover his face with both hands. Mercifully, the sound of starting fans filled the insides of the three pods. Much needed fresh air replaced the growing fragrance of waking bowels with a slight breeze that felt like an arctic blast. All three occupants spewed a steady stream of teeth chattering profanity and the air warmed.

Carlos Lockspur wanted out now; and like his two comrades, he also knew the reanimation process worked at its own mercilessly slow pace. But he didn't give a shit even if the lockdown was his fault. The cycle had become torturous.

After the long journey, the weakened crew had lost nearly 28 percent of their body mass and even the fluids pumping into their dehydrated bodies would only replenish 10 percent of that loss, meaning they needed time to heal and regain some of their body mass and a significant portion of their strength and endurance.

Dahl's arms and legs trembled violently. She couldn't even lift her own head and that was concerning because she was certain she had just seen her sister outside the pod, looking in through the viewport. How she got there, she couldn't imagine, but she knew it was her. In the next pod, Moss was certain he had seen four of the six men who had died in his command while on his other side, Lockspur had heard his dead mother calling to him through the auto doc's speaker system.

After what seemed like days, maybe even weeks, Dahl's trembling arms had finally fallen limp at her sides. At least they had stopped hurting so goddam bab. But now, her sudden inability to move only worsened her sense of captivity. Finally, her emotion boiled over and she let out a sobbing scream. Sometime after that, the warmer air blowing through her pod became unbearable. The warmer she became, the more phantom pain burst out from her reviving nervous system. She writhed in pain, gasping for air and clutching her guts as if a bullet had torn through her soft flesh. She didn't know if the pain tearing at her core was a side effect of a long stasis or a result of being in the Forbidden Planets region. Fucking Lilith, she thought, remembering what she had told her about not regretting her choice to join the team. She knew this would happen.

The debilitating pains left in the wake of the crossing distorted Dahl's usually slender frame. Normally, she looked young and fit and full of life. But now, after months of laying there naked and frozen, she thought, 'Fuck, I must look like shit; I know I smell like it.' There were fluids leaking out of every orifice in her body now. 'This is flattering,' she thought, wiping at the steady stream of clear liquid pouring from her only open nostril. The sticky fluid tasted of salty pus and the desire to yank the tube out of her burning, throbbing nostril just so she could blow her nose seemed overwhelming. "Just one swift yank and it's out." she told herself, unwisely reaching up and twisting the tube around her hand. As soon as she pulled at it, a dull tearing pain exploded from somewhere deep inside in her skull, causing her to rethink the decision. "Fuck," she screamed, sending another wave of pain up through her sore throat.

A red light next to a tiny camera popped on and a computerized voice said, "Attempting to pull out the feeding tube is strongly discouraged. There is an air bladder at the end of the tube, preventing its accidental removal during transport."

"Nice," she replied, brows furrowed and eyes squinted into slits. "You couldn't have warned me before I yanked on it."

Moss felt a stream of oily hot fluid spreading out on the bottom of his stasis pod and realized the liquid pouring into his stomach had finally reached the end of the line. The fan speed increased, only barely making the stench tolerable. He gagged and a geyser of bile blotted out the viewport. He didn't mind the dripping goo. At least the fuckers outside can't keep looking in here, he thought. He tried rather unsuccessfully to wipe the clear liquid from his face, only managing to smear it everywhere. "Shit!" he screamed, not giving a shot about the pain in his throat. This isn't just inhumane, it's goddamn humiliating. Here I am, laying in a puddle of shit with puke all over me. And the worst part about it is that I asked for this." He reached down, felt a plastic tube protruding from his manhood and thought, at least I can't piss myself. Fortunately, he didn't try to pull it out.

Moss lifted his right hand to his chest. It felt like he was holding a twenty-pound weight. He fumbled around the camera, feeling for the comms switch, pressed it clumsily after several failed attempts and said, "How does everyone feel?"

"About as good as you sound." Lockspur answered.

Dahl wanted to cry. She lay atop an oozing puddle of God only knows what, absentmindedly wiping a thick layer of slippery snot across her face.. It was running down the side of her face, filling her ear. She pressed her comms button and said, "I could use a warm shower with a sandpaper luffa, a 12 hour bubble bath and a fist full of anti-hallucinogenics."

"Mejo, what about you?" Moss said, "Are you seeing anything strange?"

"My dead mom is outside the pod." he said, tears pouring down his face. "She keeps asking me, why did I let her die?"

"It's not her," he said. "She is not real."

"I know," he said, wiping his eyes as if not wanting the others to see his shame. "I just wished it didn't feel so real."

A tone sounded in all three pods and a familiar computerized voice said, "Final protocol observed. You may now leave quarantine. Proceed to the left for showers. One deck down for the mess hall and two decks up for crew quarters. Report back here for further testing in 12 to 16 hours. I shall monitor your vital signs and notify you of any needed changes. Until then, get some rest. And please report any strange anomalies you may experience as soon as possible."

"Computer," Moss called out heatedly. "What was the final protocol?"

"Confirmation that you know the visions you are seeing are hallucinations."

Outside, the racing stars had slowed to a crawl as the mercenary ship dropped out of light speed. That had actually been sixteen days earlier. The auto doc felt no need to tell the angry crew how long they had remained in their well soiled stasis pods battling the visions. During their unwitting incarceration, the long journey had almost reached its conclusion. The edge of a seldom visited system grew out of the star speckled canvas.

G-633 - a secluded and seldom visited binary star system- spiralled a single light year off MegaCorp's back channel shipping lanes. A little known ghost lane only frequented by outlaw black market smugglers, fleeing criminals or clandestine military forces en route to some covert mission in the outer colonies. The system lay at the leading edge of the forbidden planets region. After a handful of fruitless missions to the system, finding nothing but parched soil, an acute absence of natural resources and savage beasts, no one ventured there.

Add to that, the longer a ship spent in the ghost lanes, the more the region had a way of awakening the primitive side of the mind and pushing it into overdrive. The hallucinations ended, but that's when the real fun began. The longer someone stayed in the region, the more aggressive they became. Neither Waylan Yutani nor MegaCorp's scientists had ever discovered why the animal side of the mind fired up when entering the region.

The science supporting long-term stasis said active dreaming while under was theoretically impossible. Neurons- in particular, frozen neurons- cannot pass electrical impulses at speeds fast enough to develop REM sleep. Many traveling through the region likened the experience to that of a bad LSD trip. Imagine every nightmare you've ever had rolled into one unending dreamscape only to find there is no way out, but straight through to the other side. If you're lucky, you wake up sane. If you're unlucky. You wake up a psychotic lunatic who either strokes out or your heart explodes. Welcome to the joys of long-term FTL travel in the forbidden planets region. All aboard and let the fun begin.

For the next three days, none of the wary crew spoke to one another as the routine effects of such an unusually long hyper-sleep plagued their thoughts. The inescapable after effects birthed a jumbled up mixture of jagged kaleidoscope visions woven into the most traumatic events of their lives. The visions were both bizarre and unsettling; and at their worst, they were debilitating. They forced the crew to lock themselves in their private quarters to deal with their temporary insanity in private.

Two days later, the worn down crew buried their troubled minds beneath mountains of menial tasks. Mostly, they busied their trembling hands by preparing for the upcoming mission. A mission they knew would be far from ordinary.

Only Lockspur had come out this far before, and when he found out about the mission, he had considered turning it down. Hyper-sleep in that area sucks, he thought. I'll never do it again. But Johns was paying a hefty fee for this run. He offered them 3 times the normal rate; a rate far too steep to turn down. And after all, Lockspur assured himself, it's all about the credits. And I do love credits. So, he came along for the ride, already knowing the effects it would have on him and his less experienced teammates. You guys don't know what's coming, he told them. They laughed. He wondered if they were laughing now?

He lay in the silence of his quarters, lights down low, holding a picture of his wife and two kids. But now that they were here, finally approaching their destination, Lockspur felt uneasy and wished he had rethought his earlier decision to come to g-633. This system didn't work right. It was as if the laws of physics didn't work here. Two stars rotated around each other in a queer oblong dance and 9 gas giants weaved both around them, and around each other. Add to that, there were 37 free roaming satellites that often moved their orbits from one gas giant to another. The movement dynamics in this system was in a word, unfathomable.

He sat up, itching a lump that had grown on the inside of his right forearm sometime while he was in stasis. That was odd, he thought. Things don't usually grow when you're frozen, but this had. He supposed the lump is what the auto doc had found during his wake-up call and that's the reason for the quarantine. He studied the oblong shaped lump, saw a long red line near the bottom. A line of pink dots ran along each side of the cut. Yes, he thought. I think that's where the incision was and those were stitches. But what is in there? He dug at the rock-hard lump with his fingernail, wincing as it moved around beneath the skin. Whatever it was, it was not natural. It lay just beneath the skin and it wasn't attached to anything in there because if he pushed hard enough, he could move it around. It was painful to move, but he needed to know if he should be worried. For some strange reason, he didn't understand, he hadn't shown his teammates or even had the auto doc check it out. Then a thought struck him. It's supposed to be a secret. Well... it's a pretty Goddamn good one, because I don't even know what it's for.

He had forgotten some rather important details about the lump and no matter how hard he tried to remember them, they just wouldn't come to him. He supposed he should know things like how it got there, who had put it in there and what it was for. He knew at least that much. It was for something. No. That was not quite right. It is for some... One. But he didn't know who. On that, his mind was blank.

An ominous sense of foreboding distorted his features. Lockspur thought if he didn't remember what the lump was for soon, the whole damn mission would go to shit and they'd all pay dearly.