Creation began on 12-05-14

Creation ended on 12-05-14

Species 2

Sterility in Space

A/N: We all know that in the film, the infection occurred within the span of seven minutes. The trio were completely unaware of the nightmare in their midst. But say that it didn't happen at all? Say that the alien DNA within the soil samples…simply went missing? What if someone that wasn't with them when they went to Mars…showed up and spared them an unsavory fate?

As Patrick, Dennis and Anne were preparing to leave Mars orbit, time seemed to stand still for a moment. The soil samples that Patrick collected on the surface of the Red Planet were safely tucked away in the back of the ship. But unbeknownst to the crew, the temperature thaw on one of the canisters that contained the soil samples had resulted in its lid breaking open.

As time continued to stand still for the three travelers from Earth, a shadow appeared behind them, taking the shape of a man, dressed in a futuristic suit that may have been decades ahead of the technology used to produce the spacesuits they had been made to use in the present. It was primarily black, almost like his skin tone was, with blue on the legs and boots, silver on the arms and a circle of red on the chest. The helmet on his head was like a medieval one, covering his whole face with the exception of his eyes, nose and mouth, and there was a small, crescent-shaped moon on the forehead area, generating an invisible field over the exposed area of his face. He looked at the trio, but then turned his attention to the broken canister, seeing the goop of contaminated soil, rich with the DNA of the ancient race that had destroyed Mars millions of years prior to the rise of mankind, starting to spill out, and took out a container of his own, shaped like a round-bottom flask made of silver, adorned with ancient runes, and quickly moved to begin collecting the DNA before it touched the ground.

I don't think so, he thought, slowly removing the broken canister and drained it of its contaminated contents, depriving it of all the DNA before he placed it into a plastic bag for later disposal. Too many lives are at stake here.

He sealed up the flask and replaced the broken canister with an identical one that was filled regular soil that he took from Earth that he dyed red, almost no different from the soil that Patrick had collected, but by the time the scientists discovered that the soil sample was a dud, it would be seven years too late, making the military that authorized the mission to the Red Planet assume that an error was made by the scientists. But they would make another attempt to go back to Mars in the future after that, and by that time, he would make sure that the remnants of alien DNA left on the planet would be gone.

Not all extraterrestrials are friendly, he thought again, recalling the few universes he had traveled to that had aliens that were as hazardous to humans on a genetic level as they were dangerous to them on a physical level. Little green men, cybernetic invaders, parasitic xenomorphs, invasive germs, sentient forms of energy… Many of those types spell doom for the human race if they're not dealt with. And if this pans out, the Earth will be preserved for generations to come in mankind's future.

And then, he vanished from the shuttle, and time resumed its course for the trio. It was as though he were never there…and no one was the wiser.

-x-

Whoosh! Appearing in front of a large capsule that resembled an hourglass made of gold and silver, but was empty of any sand of anything to simulate the passage of time, the man that had acquired the alien DNA from Mars placed the flask inside it.

"And that takes care of any chance of infection," he told himself, walking away from the capsule. "What's next on the agenda?"

"Hey, Brother Correction!" He turned to a prison cell made of unbreakable plastic, seeing a man that had an attitude against women. "Let me outta here! I'll pay you whatever you want! Just let me go!"

"Please, Bill Harris," the man, known as Brother Correction, expressed his contempt at the mortal's attempt to bribe him with money, "you couldn't pay me any amount of money to let you go free. An eternity here, among the other rapists I've collected over the span of my existence, along with the horde of mankind's worst members that became more or less than human, will teach you the error of your ways when you find that there's no way to get away from me. In the words of one of the detectives that would've arrested you for your history of raping and terrorizing women across the USA, "You're my bitch now". You, like the rest of the scum of the Earth that have shown no capacity at all for redemption, are all my bitches now, and that's how it's gonna be until I decide what becomes of you later on. I'm keeping the peace still…and I don't have to use a piece of steel."

Then, just like before, he vanished from sight.

-x-

Brother Correction sat on his wooden throne for the umpteenth time, examining the changes made to the future by his altering the events of the past through a crystal ball, observing the fundraiser event at the hotel in honor of the mission to Mars, listening to the speech Patrick Ross gave, as well as his one night stand with those two women that simply wanted to make it with a hero just to add him to their lists of scores and accomplishments. He kept a close watch on Patrick whenever he was with any woman, including his fiancee, and saw none of them experience anything that would've resulted in their premature demise at his hands, and concluded that the astronaut was free from biological contamination by the alien DNA, saving countless women from dying after having relations with the man and preventing an outbreak of hybrids that would've endangered the human race. A smile appeared on his face, proud of his latest accomplishment, but then it soured as the images of Patrick's future changed to show him the current future of the experimental hybrid known as Eve, the younger sister hybrid of the experiment known as Sil, her predecessor. The time spent experimenting upon her, trying to find any measure of vulnerabilities concealed in her mixed DNA in the hopes of learning how to defend mankind from the aliens if they should ever return to Earth.

Like with her sister, what she is isn't her fault, Brother Correction thought, feeling sympathy for the hybrid, understanding that the part of her that was indeed human could understand pain and hopelessness due to spending the entirety of her life in a man-free environment and unable to go anywhere beyond her cage made to accommodate a semblance of an actual lifestyle. "Fret not, Eve, for nothing is forever…and DNA can be manipulated…to the point where the two sides that make up your genetic structure will fight against one another to dominate…or even to escape in only one way."

The crystal ball, which floated in front of him in his meadow of daylight bliss, was then grabbed onto by his right hand.

A/N: And there you have it. A scenario in which everything that happened on Patrick Ross' part never happened because someone intervened.