It's the noise of the door again after what had seemed to Hicks like an endless, rotten night. A night which was so different from the first day where he felt wonderful for a change, at least bodily… and – after the android's visit – when he even felt a slight ray of hope again. And like Isis had promised, they gave him a new plasma monitor to entertain him with. Deciding there was nothing else he could do at the moment, he put the entertainment center to good use for the first time since he's been in this place, zapping through the various illusos, playing with them and altering them. Playing a few games, listening to some music. They didn't let him out of his cell that day, and nobody else had come, but his mood had been a bit lighter than the days before. All of this had ended abruptly, however, in the evening. Shortly after 10 pm, a sudden burst of anxiety overwhelmed him to the point where he couldn't even stay put on a chair. A rush of adrenaline he couldn't rationally explain flooded his veins and turned him into a human caged tiger for a time he couldn't define. And he lost time again. One moment, it was 10 pm, and when he looked the next time, 130 minutes had gone by without him being able to tell how he spent them. Pacing his cell, probably, yet he has no recollection of it. Nothing but a vague hint of blood on his tongue, a notion of violence… and lust. A disturbing combination.

Yet when he snapped out of it, he found to his dismay that reality wasn't any better. Something had changed. The good, strong feeling he had had almost for the entire day had gone - and been replaced by the sensation of his skin becoming harder and tighter like tough leather, making it increasingly hard to move at all. At last, he found that he had no other choice than to lie down, even though the flood of anxiety was far from over. It had been torture, but… his body was becoming more unresponsive by the hour.

And his eyesight decreased, too. According to Isis, his visual improvement ranged somewhere around the 400% mark, something he had not been actually aware of until she told him so – but the way it deteriorated now was even more drastic: Colors lost their shine, width of contrast vanished, and all detail lost to him - as if someone put a broad smear of grease right over his eyes. As if… as if he was going blind!

Hicks swallows. He doesn't have to remember last night to know how he felt – his condition hasn't changed. In fact, it's still in the process of becoming worse. The anxiety's gone, yeah, but it makes him realize his condition even more distinctly, now that he doesn't have anything else to occupy his attention: That disgusting notion of bursting out of his skin if he moved too much is getting more prominent, even though he's just lying on the bed, doing nothing. Gritting his teeth, he tries to sit up – but his body won't let him. His energy's gone. He feels tired, even though he just woke. Yes, it was a distressful night, but he's feeling so utterly spent, he could go to sleep right again. And when he finally opens his eyes to find out about their condition, all he's able to see is an indistinct pattern of bright and dark. What the hell is this? Is he coming down with some exotic space-disease?

"Hello? Corporal? You up?" The voice is muffled almost beyond recognition. As if the person it's belonging to was talking to him through the wall instead of standing in the next room. A shift in the indistinct pattern in front of his eyes. Someone's looking into the bedroom. "Corporal?" The muffled sound of steps… and the sensation of the force-field activating. Whoever's visiting him, he – or rather she – is afraid. No satisfaction over this fact today. Too tired... "Come on, rise and shine! It's already past 10.00 am. What is the matter with you? I thought you wanted to give me a huge list of demands? At least Isis told me so. Did you change your mind?"

It's Darwin. He's able to recognize at least that much. 'Come on, man, pull yourself together!' Somehow, everything but elegantly, he finally manages to sit up.

"My Goodness, what is the matter with you?" He can see her better now, but her image is still a one-dimensional picture. A bad photograph. He also senses others behind her. Of course. She wouldn't dare confront him all on her own. "What's the matter with your eyes?" She moves a hand up and down in his line of vision. " Do you still see me?"

"Yeah, I see you."

"What's with your skin? It looks – strange."

"Shouldn't you know?"

"I'd be glad if I did, trust me." A slight nod towards the other room. "I brought you breakfast… something decent for a change. As a sign of our good will. What happened, happened. There's no way to reverse it. We can only see what happens and document the development. We can help you cope with it, or you can do it alone. The decision is yours."

"I'm not hungry," Hicks mumbles, secretly wishing they'd leave him alone. He doesn't feel much like company. But since Isis probably arranged that her boss came down to him in person, it's on him to seize the opportunity and play his part, right? Is he crazy though? The first time they serve him something different than this aromatized mud – and he doesn't want it? To his surprise, he finds he's not lying. He isn't hungry, not at all. Although it's late in the morning, and he'd have every right to be. "Why are you here? Where's Isis?"

The break is longer than expected. And when his visitor finally speaks, she has a funny edge to her voice.

"Isis had an accident yesterday… a little run-in with Raven."

'What?!' The shock wakes him thoroughly. It is only with the last of his self-control that he manages to put a mildly surprised, slightly nasty smirk onto his face.

"A run-in with Raven? How the fuck did that happen? You let him run around the station now, or what?" Isis – is she done for? If she really was serious yesterday – what is he supposed to do now without her? It can't be that just when there's even an unlikely, small possibility for another escape-attempt, it's already taken away from him in the wink of an eye! His blood turns to ice-water when another thought hits: 'She did it! Somehow, she found out about this, and decided to destroy Isis before she could become active! Fuck! And now she's standing here, pretending to be saddened by the loss! What a bitch!' Aggression wells up in him and replaces the fundamental tiredness he's feeling, so much that he has to dig his fingers into the mattress and hold on as to not jump at the scientist and make contact with the force-field. He's had an experience with a stasis field once, a long time ago. He's not keen on an encore.

"It was during an experiment," Darwin says evenly, eyeing him closely. Checking his reaction. 'How did she know? Can she read minds, for Christ's sake?'

"An ex – oh no! You did it, right? Isis told me you'd be crazy enough to try it." A matter-of-factly nod. "You people just don't learn."

"I must say I underestimated his reaction," the young woman says, her eyes on the worthless instruments behind Hicks. Useless, because his PTS was disabled by the nanobots in his blood the night before. Too bad. Before, the readouts enabled her to judge his condition at least a bit, but now, whatever he's really feeling is a complete mystery to her. "I thought Isis would be able to handle him. I was wrong."

"Yeah, well…" Hicks snorts, "that's hardly a surprise." A deep breath, then a knowing look in her direction, even if he can just see a blur. "You created another monster. One you possibly won't be able to control like the aliens. A sick, human brain with alien instincts and ferocity. What kind of a feeling is that?"

She shrugs.

"It's not like our usual research is a walk in the park, either. We're used to these kind of challenges."

"Right. That's why the little unexpected run-in, huh? Totally intentional. And yet you are still so sure you're able to handle me. That's… astounding... or should I say 'arrogant'?"

"Unlike others, I'm able to learn from my few mistakes," his visitor replies coolly, not rising to the challenge. "I generally don't commit the same faux-pas twice, so just forget about it."

Hicks nods, diverting his attention to a cloud of stomach-teasing odor that comes drifting through the door. The smell of scrambled eggs and bacon. Something too good to be true! So what if his appetite has gone AWOL, he can't let this opportunity pass. He swings his legs over the side of the bed.

"So, you're here because you wanna hear my demands and brought me breakfast, that's it, huh? Why don't I buy that?"

"Because you're not stupid, probably." She takes a step back, inviting him to get up from the bed and follow her to the living room. Always on her guard, even though the force field is protecting her. "I thought once you agreed, we could get started right away. I've got a couple of questions for you… some concerning your behavior last night."

Her words electrify him.

"Why?" The sensation of sticking in a too-tight wet-suit as he steps up to the table is annoying. Heck, why shouldn't he play along and get some of his questions answered, too?

"Well, for once, since it was quite bizarre?"

He throws himself unceremoniously onto the chair – his knees won't bend properly - and forks the first piece of egg into his mouth. Relishes in the experience. It seems egg never tasted that good in his life. The coffee's a little on the strange side this morning, but heck, he can't have everything, right?

"Bizarre?" He echoes, mouth full. "Meaning what?"

"You don't remember doing anything unusual last night?" She sinks into his couch. Watching him intensely. Somehow, it seems to Hicks she's further away than it looks. He only hears her voice in a strangely muffled way and tilts his head sideways, first to the left, than to the right, to check for any air-bubbles in his ears, gently squeezing his left ear to his head with the palm of his free hand. No, sir. The sensation's unshakable. He sighs to himself.

"Got any problems with your hearing?" Darwin puts the subject up.

"I hear you fine," he lies. "What do you mean by 'unusual'? Eating the feast you nice people served me, playing a few games, or going to bed? Anything I should have done, that you expected me to do, which I didn't? Like cocooning myself before going to sleep, or what?"

"I was more talking about tossing around in you bed, pacing your room like a tiger on ecstasy or trashing your place. Biting through your lip. Was dinner so bad you tried to eat yourself?"

He can't say anything. Reflexively, his hand goes up to touch his mouth, to gently brush over his lower lip. Nothing there.

"You're bullshitting me."

"Wanna see for yourself?" With a casual gesture, his guest takes a remote from the pocket of her frock, and the new plasma monitor flickers to life. To Hicks, curious as he is, it's nothing more than a blur of colors, and so he shifts his attention back to Darwin. "What? You don't want to see it?"

"I can't," he confesses reluctantly. "My eyesight started to deteriorate last night. Guess I need glasses now. Thanks." The fork hits the empty plate, and he puts it down and leans back, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Just a few minutes ago you said you could see me just fine."

"I said I saw you. Your shape. No details. And it's getting worse."

"I figured there was something wrong with your eyes. They look kind of thick. It started yesterday evening, you said?" He doesn't answer. "And what's with your skin? You look uncomfortable. That started yesterday too? Let me see." She gets up to get a closer look at him and sees his defensive expression. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you. I just want so see."

He gives her a long, hard stare, barely seeing her. Only vaguely sensing her presence.

She's taking her time; causing a long uncomfortable silence between them that leaves Hicks more than just a little anxious.

"So, what is it?"

"I'm not sure.... " She leans back again. "But from what I can see from here, it looks as if the corneas have thickened. Just like your skin - it looks a bit like sturdy leather. Not flexible anymore." Hicks swallows. Great. Just what the fuck is happening to him? "Of course I can't say anything definitive right now without a more thorough examination, but I've got a theory... Would you like to hear it?"

"Let me guess." The scrambled eggs suddenly toss and turn in his upset stomach as if it had turned into a washing machine. "I'm developing a – what do you call that stuff? A chitinous shell? A fuckin' body armor?" Man, that thought is scary! His heartbeat accelerates.

"I don't know." He can't see her expression, and her voice doesn't give anything away. "I've never seen a human being in your state, but… it's not uncommon in nature. If I'm right, of course. If I'm right, you're about to shed your old skin."

"Excuse me?" His skin would crawl if it were still able to do so. But at least, the short hairs on the back of his neck do as his nerve-endings order them to – they stand up.

Darwin sounds excited now, and while Hicks thought this was about the first halfway normal conversation they were having, he can't help but utterly hate her with renewed force.

"Just like a snake, you know? Exactly like a snake – or a spider! Have you ever seen a snake shed its skin? At first, they get all immobilized by their sturdy old skin. Even their eyes cover up. The corneas thicken, and they go entirely blind, just like you! And then, one day, when the new skin has fully developed, they break through their old hull and slip out, bigger, badder and meaner than ever before. I wonder if it's really this that is happening."

"Yeah..." This is making Hicks physically sick. Disgusted with himself. Is this really what's happening to him? Fuck, he's an animal then, right? Nothing but a big spider with a few legs missing. Or a snake? The image of himself crawling out of a perfect, hollow image of himself, flicking his tongue, his eyes with now slitted pupils, gives him the absolute creeps. The lump of egg in his now throbbing stomach has become the hot, pulsing center of the universe. If he's got to puke in front of her, he hopes he'll at least hit her and share some of the indignity. "This would really get you off, right? Me turning into one of those things?"

"As a matter of fact, no. I would like for you to stay in your human shape as much as possible. Having you turn into an alien wouldn't serve the purpose."

"Right," he wisecracks, not really feeling like joking. "The Corps doesn't make uniforms this size. Very costly to order thousands of new battle outfits. Bad for project 'Perfect Soldier'."

"That, and the small advantage of remaining able to blend in with the rest of humanity . We want to develop indestructible soldiers who can control their special abilities and use them only when they're called for. After all, we want them to be able to lead a reasonably normal life. We don't-" she furrows her brow at Hicks' laughter, "-we don't want them to be beasts that spend their off-mission lives in cages."

"Jesus, you're really full of it! You think you can create alien-human hybrids who lead normal lives and walk among the rest of the population unnoticed? Please!" He shakes his head. "How about if that person wants to have a family? Or-"

"It's news to me that you Colonial Marines make out with civilians. Isn't it an unspoken rule among you only to become engaged with someone who's spending half of his life in cryosleep, too? To escape the nasty side effect of having one part of the couple age while the other sees him wither away whenever he's there to actually see it?"

"Okay, right … but you've got no idea what will happen if two hybrids do the Cha Cha together, either, right? I mean, you can't! How? You don't even know what's happing with Raven and me. You don't know how it affects women. You haven't got a clue how the chromosomes of two hybrids would mix. Geez, it makes me sick just thinking about this!"

"Well," she shrugs. "You're right. But we've only just begun. It could still take years until we know everything, but so what? The possibilities are endless. We'll find a way to make it work, trust me." A sharp beep out of her pocket makes her jump. "Well, I'm sorry I have to end this interesting discussion now but I'm needed somewhere else. Write down your demands. I'll either be back later this afternoon or have my assistant pick them up. Oh, and you might want to ready your mind for our first request: We need samples."

"Samples?" The word alone gives him the creeps. "Of what?"

"Skin. Blood. The works."

"You sure you'll be able to get them?"

"You want us to help you with this condition you're in, you'll have to cooperate, Corporal." She stands up. "I'll be back this afternoon… think about it. We can get what we need either way, but it would be in your best interest not to cause us any problems." Her steps sound further away, and the hiss of the door tells Hicks he's about to be left alone again. Good. He's not feeling well. He wants to lie down again and think about what he's just heard. Especially pondering the problem what he's supposed to do without the android. Looks like there's no way out of this cell without her. Apparently, no one else is deemed capable of controlling him. So, no park. No secret plans. No nothing.

And what does it mean for him now that Raven is one of his breed too? His own unusual behavior last night… he's got the gloomy feeling there's a connection. He'll have to ask Darwin for details when she returns. He's got to know whether he's sharing his mind not only with predatory space bugs, but a blood-thirsty mass murder now, too.

Grim prospects. What he is becoming? How is he supposed to stay sane? Where is this all leading to? And why should he even fight when it doesn't look like a good outcome's still within reach for him?

Enough food for thought to cause him headaches. With a grim, dark expression on his face, Hicks – with some difficulty - gets up and hunkers back to his bedroom and all but lets himself fall onto the mattress. His condition's getting worse by the minute, his body becoming a prison. What is he becoming? What will he be once he wakes up the next time? A bloodthirsty, unstoppable predator? Is this the last time he'll go to sleep as Dwayne Hicks, the last time he knows who and what he is?

Fear presses his lungs together, tightens his throat. There's nothing he can do. Nothing but wait… and follow his body's call into a realm of unspeakable horror…

***

"-sis? Do you hear me?"

A voice in the darkness. The blackness is complete. No shadows, no irregularities. The kind of darkness that's telling me that my visuals don't work, and I can't move. I want to answer Darwin – at least I think I recognize her voice – but I'm dead like a stone. Except… my port's open. She wired me up to something, probably her computer. It should be able to communicate this way.

'Hello Darwin,' I answer, hoping that the words will appear on her monitor. What if she thinks I'm a hopeless case and throws me away?

"I can't make her talk," I hear my bosses reply. She sounds worried. A rare enough sound from her. "I already exchanged the unit and downloaded the system onto the new one, but still… You got an idea? Oh, wait, there she is!" A short break. "She hears me." A sigh of relief. "Well, that's at least something after 24 hours of hard work. I was beginning to despair."

24 hours? She's been working on me for an entire day? What happened? Am I in pieces? I send her my question and am rewarded with a reply a short while later.

"You had a run-in with Raven during the treatment. Don't you remember?"

I'm trying to. I try to remember what experiment she's talking of. Who Raven is. It won't come. Immediately, I'm worried. What happened to my storage? My memories? A brief internal hardware check brings another subject of worry to my mind: 'New hardware detected. Install?'

'No.'

"She doesn't remember," I hear Darwin say to whoever. But I didn't mean the 'no' in answer to her question. More worry in her voice. "I can restore what I have from the last backup, but… it's been a while. She'd lose her entire new personality if I couldn't retrieve the data she accumulated in the meantime." She pauses. I hear some very low murmur, too low for me to hear who it is or what he's saying. And I'm too preoccupied with my discovery, anyway.

'Unknown virus detected. Run counter-measures?'

It takes my breath away, even if I'm nothing but brain right now. Finally. What I feared for all the time has come true. I'm infected. Does Darwin see my inner battle on her monitor? Does she know the problem? Strangely enough, I don't want her to know yet.

'Initiate counter-measures. Issue full report.'

Columns of data at a rate no human being would be able to make sense of, but they make plenty of sense to me, even in my deranged state. The 'new hardware' seems to have spread through my entire body. A larger object of unknown function has been built around my CPU, has in fact been blended in perfectly with the given surroundings. The other objects – miniscule, of microscopic proportions – move around in my bloodstream. Doing things to my system I can't define. 'Rearranging' it.

"At least six weeks worth, I'm afraid. I've been slack. Too much pressure with this xenomorph-project. I could kill myself!" I hear Darwin as background walla. "No, I'm not sure they're entirely lost. She just can't access them. At least I hope so. And she can't move. And – Isis? Can you see anything? Or feel?"

'Nothing,' I answer, just diverting enough attention from my inner battle as necessary to answer her. 'I can only hear you. How bad am I, Darwin? Am I in pieces? Beyond repair?'

"No, you're not beyond repair. At least I don't think so. It might take a while, and I still need to find replacement parts for your hand, but I'm confident you'll be up and running in no time… if I could just figure out what happened to your memory…" The sound of fingers flying over a keyboard. "So, you got no other idea, right?" She doesn't seem to mean me, and so I'm off into myself again.

'Counter-measures executed. Elimination of virus unsuccessful. Retry? Abort?'

What is this? What's in my body? If I could only access my memory files! I shift my attention back at the larger object in my head. Somehow, I feel this is what's causing the problem. I scan it. It's blended so seamlessly into the hardware, it feels as if it's supposed to be there. But I'm sure it's not. What could it be good for? Some sort of communication device? Did Darwin build it? No, can't be. Its doesn't look like humans built it at all. It feels utterly alien.

'Install'? Shall I do it? Shall I run the risk of maybe losing myself entirely? Maybe it's some sort of remote control – 'Built by whom?' – and as soon as I activate it, I'll be nothing than a puppet? I want to ask Darwin what to do, I want to ask her whether she implanted it into my head, but… something holds me back. Something I can't name. I just know I don't want her to know about it. Install – or not? What to do? Somehow I'm under the impression it's working already… it's just waiting for me to plug in and make use of whatever it's delivering. I won't get anywhere by just pondering about it. 'Install.'

As soon as I've issued the order, I'm rewarded with static, both optic and acoustic. Leaving Darwin behind, I dive into it, relieved I still seem to be myself. I still know what I'm doing. Except I can't make anything of the data I'm receiving. Are they encrypted? I run them through a sequence of filters until finally I get the frequency loud and clear. High-pitched noises, almost too high to hear even for me, their format a mystery to me. And images. Scrambled, but I manage to make them clearer in surprisingly short time. And internally lean back to look.

A room. The image is still blurred, but it looks familiar. The accompanying noise is… an intake of breath. Someone's breathing. Slowly, regularly. Whoever it is I'm receiving, he appears to be sleeping. Passive. The image changes. A face – no. Some vague shape, swimming in and out of focus. At first, it looks thoroughly human, the next moment, it melts into something unsettling. Too blurred to make out in detail, but unsettling. And it's too dark to see it properly. Then, as if the sender of these images recognized he's being watched, everything goes dim, as if he's deliberately turning down the light. Then nothing but black. Just what the hell was that?

'Hello?' My message leaves me not in the form of words, but as an image. I'm sending my picture. The transceiver – what the device must be – formats my thoughts and sends them out! Fascinating! How does it work? Maybe it doesn't, because I don't get anything back but static. Whatever I just tapped into, it's not responsive.

'Hello? Can anybody read me?' This feels almost familiar. A bit like my conversations with Rogue through subspace communication. If I were human, I'd probably think I was dreaming. 'I am not able to dream. So this must be for real.' Funny thing, that scrambler. It takes my words and transforms them into images. For a moment a thought flashes through my mind – 'What if Darwin reads them on her monitor?', but just as I get ready to have another go at that dark transmission with the breathing sound, it's drowned out by two others, overlapping. One, hardly perceptible under the other, stronger one, consists of Raven's blood-streaked face. My blood, mixed with his. He looks disappointed. Disappointed he didn't kill me. He opens his mouth, but before he can utter a sound, something else comes booming in with the force of a virtual battering ram! And something in my body reacts. Somehow, I feel as I were but a giant antenna, with the radio waves filling me up, seeping out of me. An unsettling sensation. Reflexively, I tune it down. I don't know how I'm doing it, but it works just the same. This presence is different than Raven's, so utterly different, I don't know what to name it. A different feel to it, a different format. Not hesitant, but commanding. Probing. Trying to access my memory! And suddenly, the connection's cut, I don't know why. Did I do it? How?

Slowly, I drift to the surface again enough to hear Darwin still talking somewhere to my left.

"Okay… I'm on my own here, huh?… Yeah, I know. But what will you do if someday I can't find a solution?… No, I'm sure I will. Hikahi already stitched her up. Maybe I should wait with the activation of her sensory input until she's fully healed, what do you think? We shouldn't have to wait too long, she heals fast. – Yes, sure. If I run into any more problems, I let you know, thanks. – You too.. Don't stick your nose out too far, you hear me?" Silence. Who is she talking to? Steps, coming closer. Stopping on my right side.

"Don't worry, Isis. You're going to make it. It was close, but there's nothing I can't repair. And I will solve that memory problem, too. You're going to be just the way you were one second before it happened."

To my surprise, I find my memory's working again. It must have been for some time now, but I didn't even notice. I remembered Raven. The experiment. The xenomorphs. Hicks. It's all back suddenly. I was just too preoccupied to notice. And I'm still having a hard time trying to shake the feeling of that big conscience trying to control me.

"I think it's already up and running again." How exactly did I restore it? By installing the new device? Was it blocking my memory? "Maybe it was just sensory overload. Raven attacked me, right?" I hear my words uttered by a bland, female voice. She put me on voice-mail, since I still can't talk for myself. A strange sensation. Couldn't she have chosen a better one? This one sounds utterly stupid!

"He almost disassembled you, Ice. You remember it now?"

"Yes."

"Do you feel anything? Like… I don't know… pain?

"He got me good, didn't he?"

"Yes." From the noises I hear I get the impression Darwin's sitting down beside me. A brief tug at my port. "By ramming you through the console, he almost electrocuted you. Well, and the shock of the defibrillation obviously finished what he started, but it was the only option I could think of. You shorted out. I'm optimistic though there won't be any permanent damage. I was quite worried about your memory block. But now that you're finally able to access it again… How did you do it?"

"I don't know," I answer truthfully. "How do I look, Darwin? Am I still in one piece?"

"Sure. Don't worry about it. He bit a couple of holes in your face and opened your neck. You are also badly burned in a couple of places. For a human it would be bad but I'm positive you'll fully recover. The only thing I'm not yet sure of is your hand. It could get hard finding the right parts. We may ultimately have to build them ourselves, but I'm doing my best. Hopefully, all you'll need is another visit at a tattoo-parlor once I'm through with you. Hikahi applied some synth-flesh to your wounds, and it's growing fine. If it keeps on healing at that rate, there'll be nothing visible in a couple of days." Humor? From Darwin? I'm surprised. And she sounds so unusually warm. I half expected her to blame me for what happened. The dumb android screwed up, right? But no. "You can't move yet, right?"

I try.

"No."

"I thought so. The circuit's fried. I'm gonna have to replace it." I hear a suppressed yawn. "Oh well…" The bright sound of an instrument she's picking up.

"Wait…" Sure, she's a genius, but even a genius gets exhausted, right? And exhaustion causes mistakes. I don't want her to cut through something vital because she doesn't know what she's doing anymore. "Why don't you take a break, Darwin?"

"What?" An unbelieving laugh. "You like lying around, totally immobilized?"

"I don't mind. I can take it for a while longer. It's not like I'm missing something important, right? Go to sleep for a couple of hours. You sound as if you could use it. I don't want you to fall asleep with the cutting-torch in my innards." She laughs at that. "Finish me tomorrow. I'll be fine, don't worry. I'm going to have to run a couple of rather lengthy systems checks, anyway."

"You sure?" She doesn't object. Usually she doesn't like people trying to decide for her. She must be really tired.

"Absolutely. Let me lie here for the night and heal up a little more, and tomorrow you fix me, first thing in the morning. How does that sound?"

"Like a plan, I'd say." I don't know what she does, it's a strange little noise, like a little clap. Could she be patting my hand? No, I decide. Too far out of character. The chair next to me creaks, and then the sound of footsteps. "All right, I'll go. But I'll hook up the voice-mail to my bedroom. If anything happens, wake me, okay? I don't want to lose my favorite assistant in the world."

'What could possibly happen?' I think. If I'm really at her private quarters – and it sounded like that – I'm in the safest room of the entire station.

"You can do that, of course. But I doubt I'll use it. See that you get some shut-eye, boss."

"Well… good night then, Isis."

"Good night, Darwin."

The sound of her steps fades, and I'm alone. Good. I want to know more about the transceiver. I know its source now. When Raven attacked me, he accidentally mixed his blood with mine: He gave me the nanobots. What Hicks wanted for me to do is reality now. I doubt I would have done it if the decision had been up to me, but now I'm dealing with a changed reality. A reality that has opened prospects for me I didn't dare dream of before. The xenos are biomechanical creatures, and so am I. I must have the capability to use their technology to our advantage. I know have. I'm pure logic, at least I used to be. I'll have to find it in me again. To push aside the doubts and emotions which had hindered me to pursue my mission with the necessary determination. This phase is over. I know what I have to do now… and I need Hicks to follow me…

***

The queen is confused. For the first time since these sub-space encounters started happening to her, she's come across a being she was almost able to understand. She understood enough of it to see the similarities between them. The being on the other end was like her in a way. Something programmed, just like her. And yet, something driven by instincts, too – again, just like her. A biomechanoid. But not one of her kind. She is sure about that. They should nevertheless have been able to communicate on some level, as the nanobots had already established the transceiver in this one. Yet when she diverted her full attention at the creature, it withdrew. It shut her off, denied her entry! How can this be possible? She's still got access to the micro-machines in its body, but they only build what she's telling them to build. She can't force the being to open itself to her again through them… or can she? Maybe there is a way. Her orders enter the stream…

***

Diffuse, dark gray. The roar of wind in his ears. It is cold, and he is all alone. Feeling the call, but he doesn't know which way to turn. Doesn't know which way is up or down. The world is a shifting, swirling, turning liquid, and what looks like a path for a moment flows apart the next. And he can't move. His body disobeys his orders. It feels as if he's cemented into the ground. Can barely rise his head, even when the wind stops abruptly. A heavy, expectant silence replaces it, and a tropical greenhouse-atmosphere – hot, humid – chases away the cold. Once again struggling against his restraints, Hicks tilts his head to the side and sees why his efforts are fruitless: They glued him to the wall, right next to the decaying corpse of a stranger. His hands and feet are buried in the warm, dry, organic stuff they use as building material. Not a chance of getting them out.

The biomechanical device inside his head picks up signals upon signals. He's not alone anymore. The place is bursting with life. There's movement all around him, fast, purposeful. Flickering messages that race through his mind too fast for him to make sense of. But he knows where he is now, even before he hears Her labored breathing. The stream. He's entered the stream. He's not bodily in Her hive, but his mind is nevertheless convinced of the altered reality his eyes show him.

The queen's presence fills him with a sense of wholeness and awe… and fear, but only in the very back of his mind. Instinctively, he knows why he's here. She summoned him for a questioning. To dive into his memory and extract what she needs. She is losing patience with him, the urgent vibe she's exuding is unmistakable. He's learning too slowly, too reluctantly, and their time is running out. For the good of the hive, She needs to find a way to overcome the enemy now. And of the three new additions to Her colony – three? – She deems him most suited for the task. He understands this all without questioning how or why, because his own train of thought is blocked by Her. The mother of the hive is demanding his undivided attention.

The first image she transmits is that of the human predator: easy to control, willingly following her orders, but his data-base is not as vast and complicated as Hicks'. He doesn't possess strategic intelligence, or far-reaching technical knowledge. He doesn't know about force fields or other security measures. He's a physical weapon, raw power and bloodlust, but no warrior in the true sense. Someone to keep their captors busy with once they're outside their prison, but no one who can get them out of this place. Raven's picture floats through Hicks' mind, and he takes it in without emotion.

The image flows apart and is replaced with another one, a biomechanical creature. In some ways related to them – delicate and yet stronger than any other creature within reach, but also vastly different. And not yet controllable. She can't access the being's data-base, and even the nanobots in its body are getting more difficult to handle. It's like they've been reprogrammed, listening to a different master now. How can this be? She needs to find a solution to this problem, but in the meantime, it is better not to count this creature on her side. For all She knows, it could even pose a threat to them. The image of a woman's face, heavily tattooed, swims into focus. Hicks knows her, but is too dazed to feel something like surprise over it.

And then he sees himself, even if his face looks vaguely different with its gleaming metallic eyes and the cruel expression in them. Apparently, she deems him as appropriate for the task, even if she is not satisfied with his cooperation yet. A flood of images explodes in Hicks' skull with the force of a mind-bomb, dozens of questions at the same time: How are they being kept in their cage? Why can't they get outside? Why can't they reach the beings that occasionally enter the hive and remove Her offspring? And – most important – how to change it? How to overcome the barriers, to turn their prison into a breeding ground? She needs his assistance, and she's not in the mood to be put on hold any longer by his clumsy, barely understandable replies. He's had enough time to learn the use of the subspace communicator. He must tell her!

And he wants to tell her – at least part of him. After all, he's part of the hive! They've got the same mission – to get out of this place – and to punish their torturers for what they did to him and his half-brothers. They both want the same… except… except another part of him is still human enough to put up resistance. If he helps them out, there'll be a bloodbath on this station, and maybe not just on the station.

'Why should you worry? Let 'em all die – they deserve it!' The voice in his mind is strong and loud – and it's not talking in human-tongue. It belongs to the half of his existence that wants the bloodbath. That wants to be a substantial element of the slaughter. It's strong, but not alone. There are concerns floating through the back of his mind this half hates, but it can't silence them. What if the aliens get off Phooka, get on a ship and start infesting the colonies? It could be the beginning of the end, all thanks to him! No! He can't do it. He can't-

A silver bolt of pain races through the part of his brain that just thought that treacherous thought. Hicks yells, reflexively trying to press his hands against his temples, but they are still glued to the wall, useless. Blood spurts out of his nostrils, drips into his mouth for him to taste, runs down his chin and drips onto his chest.

"Stop it! Stop it! Please!" He's not aware he's uttering his plea in human tongue. It makes the queen angry, and the rest of the hive, too. The pressure intensifies even more, but he can still hear the combined hiss of the queen and her two dozen drones. It's clear what she means: There's only place for one mind in the hive, and it's hers. She can't tolerate his ongoing resistance any longer. He's got to give up his individuality, his human-ness, or she'll squash him like a bug. There's no room for human thoughts in her nest!

The pain is intense, and the taste of his own blood strengthens his alien part, wakes its savageness and melts away the mental blockade he's been keeping up.

"Shit, why are you so fuckin' stubborn?" a well-known voice laughs, coming closer. "Just join. You don't owe these fuckers nothin'. Look at what they've done to you. You don't want a little revenge, huh?" Big boots fill out his range of vision. It takes Hicks an inhuman effort to raise his head and look at Raven. The sight of the killer takes his breath away, even though he knows that this is not reality. It's a dream with some reality mixed into it, but the iron metal surface and the chrome-glittering teeth the giant gave himself in this realm – along with the silver eyes – turned his appearance into that of a monster… a monster with Raven's grin. "Nice outfit, huh? Being one of them is quite a sensation!"

"This isn't real," Hicks manages to croak. "I'm dreaming. Get the fuck out of my head – all of you!" Roaring laughter meets his outburst – and another bolt of pain, enough to make him sick. "You kill me, bitch, and you get nothing, you hear me?" He tries to send her an angry image, but can't concentrate enough. Something moves in his body, and the next moment, the pain starts there, too. She's activated the nanobots, told them to tear into his body, to destroy their work of many days… slowly. She's serious. If he doesn't give Her what She wants, She'll kill him right here, right now. But can She? If this is just a dream -

"This ain't real?" Raven grins. "Maybe you're dreaming, I'm not. Fuckin' get it in your head, man: She wants us to help Her, and she'll reward us if we do! You don't wanna get out? You like it in here? Speak for yourself, man! Me, I'm sick and tired of this fuckin' place. I wanna get even with that little blonde bitch."

"I bet." Hicks groans. His veins feel as if they were filled with liquid fire.

"You're doing this to yourself, asshole! She doesn't want to punish you. And hell, you've got no idea what she does when she's happy with you. She's got a way of rewarding someone, let me tell you! You don't ever want her to stop." Raven turns to the matriarch and stretches out his arm, almost touching the vulnerable part directly over the glassy jaws. "Right, darlin'? Show him. He doesn't understand."

A whirl of colors from the transceiver takes Hicks' vision away and reduces him to senses, only. The mind's disconnected by the sudden exhilaration his body is reacting with. Something, not exactly an odor, but more of an… essence… enters his airways through his still bleeding nose and floods down his throat to fill up his bronchia and lungs. Fills him up whole. Takes away the hurt and soothes his tortured body with a feeling of belonging, of plunging into the stream, all-encompassing. Sexual. Urgent. Overwhelming. So powerful, he can only moan. It gets stronger. And stronger. Becomes almost unbearable in its pleasure, but he never wants it to stop. Stronger. And – suddenly it's gone, and the landing in the world of hurt he was in before is hard. So hard all Hicks can do is gasp. There's no air left for a scream in his lungs.

"See? You'd be crazy not to want this." Raven's voice clearly conveys the pleasure he, too, felt in the pheromone cloud. "You can have it all the time. Just join us. This supposedly heroic stuff you're doing is complete bullshit. No one's gonna reward you for it. There are no medals for stupidity. Be smart, be on the winners' side, come on!"

His words sink in. Before they ricocheted off the human part of Hicks' mind like bullets, but his resistance is melting away now, even though he is desperately trying to hold it up. The holes in his cover get bigger. They eat into the rest of his willpower like acid, dissolve it, help the other part to get stronger, to develop. The taste of his own blood fuels its fury, makes it ravenous until it turns on the other one to sink its teeth and claws into the fighting rest of human identity. This is the enemy, right here with them. Holding them captive. Torturing them. Killing them. It has to be exorcised from this body once and for all. Once they control the human hull, they can concentrate on creating the perfect opportunity for their escape. By keeping up the human facade, it should be possible to get them within reach of the force-field generators. To do that, they can't kill off the human part of the mind entirely. They'll need it as a basic program to run this body – they won't be able to make use of its technical and strategic knowledge otherwise. They need it to be able to communicate – language, human interaction, everything to assure the rest of its species it's still one of them. All things that are a mystery to their race. They are too different. There's only one way to accomplish this – the two identities have to merge.

Tearing and ripping into the essence of the other mind with a new purpose, the queen forces her way in.