1730 HRS

NASA EXPLORATION BASE

He dragged his feet up to the window, and stuck his face out – hoping for the slightest breeze to brush against his sweaty face, something to ease the unbearable heat that was enveloping the room. Mash Lexington had hoped that things would be cooler here in Tokyo compared to the dry heat back in Ecuador, but who was he kidding? Summers everywhere were hot. It was when the sun waged war, its own concept of retribution for the long dark days of winter. He took out his handkerchief and dabbed lightly at his brow.

'Mash, you in or out?' called out a voice from across the room.

'They have millions to fund these explorations but not enough to spare for a bloody air conditioner.' griped Mash, ignoring the question.

The other individual shrugged and spoke to his counterpart across the small round table. 'He's folded.'

The man being spoken to gave a slight chuckle and stared at his cards. 'You know, Jarreck, if it weren't for his daring impulsiveness,' the man nodded in Mash's direction, 'I'd almost swear that he's petrified of losing.'

Jarreck, a rugged man in his late twenties, looked up from his cards at the Japanese man sitting across from him and sighed. 'Scientists, man. All the same.'

'That's a little pot-calling-the-kettle-black, don't you think? Remind me again – about what it is that you do?'

'Used to do.' emphasized Jarreck.

'Right...How could I forget?' nodded his comrade, feigning complete understanding.

Fox Jarreck pursed his lips together and pretended to be engrossed by the cards he held in his hands. His temper rarely bubbled over, and it only required certain catalysts for it to do so. This was one of them.

The Romulus craft incident wasn't news to anyone. But that didn't stop it from being repeated several times over. The events didn't need to be recent in order for it to still be fresh in his mind. His mind wandered back, to three years ago when he had recently graduated from Langston University in Canberra, Australia – one the five prestigious universities in the world, with a PhD in molecular physics. After so many years of learning, he'd wanted to put the information he'd acquired to good use. Several companies pursued him, but there was only one place he knew that his future lied in. NASA. At the time, it was in the process of being bought over by a budding monopoly – Weyland Yutani – a company that engaged in funding research from archeology to revolutionary relativistic physical expeditions. But that made it all the more enticing and exciting for Jarreck. Now he needn't waste his time trying to convince other companies to provide grants – Weyland Yutani would undoubtedly fund every approved research project NASA conjured up.

For two years, his life was near perfect. He had signed on at NASA for a steady twenty five years, was on the honor payroll – something unusual for a new recruit, was engaged to a beautiful woman and was making progress towards a modified theory of interstellar travel. He was on a winning streak.

But all good things come to an end, and his came sooner than later.

The Romulus was a decidedly newer and faster model of a craft designed to stay out in space for longer periods of time. It had taken several years of effort, on the part of scientists like himself, to create such a marvelous piece of technology and obviously, millions of dollars in funding. NASA had decided to finally put this craft to the test by sending it out with a crew of seven to Matricular – another galaxy – a few light years away from earth. The only hitch was that NASA was not allowed to select its crew members, such decisions fell into the domain of Weyland Yutani. But a compromise was reached – NASA got to choose three people while Weyland Yutani selected the other four. Perhaps NASA should have questioned this call, but time was running short and everyone was so eager to get the ball rolling on the project that such glitches were carelessly overlooked.

Jarreck was selected to be third in command, an offer he immediately accepted without hesitation. The journey was estimated to take about a year, at the maximum, simply an expedition to test the capabilities of the Romulus. Things were running smoothly until – during the seventh week – events became separated into two alternate points of view, what later became known as the infamous Weyland Yutani Co. vs. F. H. Jarreck case. According to Weyland Yutani, Jarreck must have experienced some sort of mental chemical imbalance that led to the Romulus disaster. He miscalculated certain events and became suicidal, terminating all cryo-stasis tubes on board, thereby killing all of his crew members. Finally, in realization of what he had just done, Jarreck did not want to cause injury to himself anymore. So he must have decided to eliminate all evidence against him which led to him setting the Romulus to self-destruct mode. He had managed to escape with his life by jettisoning himself aboard a life-support escape pod. Clearly, Weyland Yutani had said, in their closing statement, Jarreck was mentally imbalanced and should be placed in a correctional institution with close supervision.

Jarreck's version of this story was a little different.

Two of the four crew members that Weyland Yutani had selected were discovered to be synthetics, artificial persons placed on board for reasons unknown. Unfortunately for the crew of the Romulus, this discovery was made purely by accident when both synthetics malfunctioned simultaneously and attempted to take the lives of all crew members on board. For all intents and purposes, they succeeded. Four of the human crew were killed – two of them in their sleep, and the other two were beaten to death. Until it became a simple yet horrifying game of cat and mouse between the three individuals left on board the massive craft. The only option left – it seemed to Jarreck – was to abandon ship, to leave in an escape pod and to set the Romulus to self-destruct mode. It broke his heart to do so – to destroy years of effort, but at the time, survival was all that counted. And he was determined to live to tell the tale. He managed to save the ship's log disk on file, to serve as evidence which would undoubtedly support his side of the story.

But he miscalculated such certainties. When he was picked up by a military convoy and brought back to earth, the disk he so carefully preserved proved to be blank and could not support his version of events in the least. So began a drawn a drawn-out trial in which Jarreck felt as if his life was falling apart slowly and painfully. His fiancée left him on immediate learning of his alleged suicidal tendencies and took most of the money they held in their joint account with her. His contract at NASA was suspended and was due for termination soon. He no longer held any prestigious position anywhere in the country – he might as well have been a homicidal maniac the way the company described him.

But in the flurry of the storm, there appeared a beacon of friendly light. The co-chair of the biological division at NASA, Doctor Jakob Reuban, testified on behalf of Jarreck. He speculated that perhaps conditions on board the Romulus could have caused hallucinations in all of the crew members and there was no way to confirm anybody's version of events. Taking a further step to support the younger man, Dr. Reuban launched a full-scale investigation of the Romulus's internal structure. What he found almost saved Jarreck's career. The coolant system was discovered to leak out certain gases – previously gone undetected by systems on board. The gases caused a certain amount of synaptic interference and hence, possibly disturbing hallucinations. They could not have anticipated such consequences, because the compound was not included in the coolant fluid itself, but was a result of a combination of several different chemicals. At the time, Jarreck himself did not take to the evidence well. To his lawyer and Reuban, he emphatically stated that he had not conjured up such delusions of grandeur. He was not normally given to flights of fancy. The androids did malfunction, and they did kill everyone else on board. Jarreck's lawyer and Reuban did not believe that this was of pressing concern at that moment. What was important was that they now had a solid piece of evidence that could potentially clear Jarreck's name. He reluctantly consented and the matter was brought up in court. The evidence did not prove Jarreck not-guilty, but it did grant him a mistrial.

After the storm had blown over, Jarreck found that his reputation would remain tarnished, but at this point he was just thankful to still have a job and to be able to walk around a free man. Reuban had petitioned for Jarreck to continue to work at NASA as a flight officer, and his request was granted – given that Jarreck come under the supervision of Reuban himself on all extraterrestrial missions. If anything were to go wrong, Reuban would be held completely accountable for Jarreck's actions.

Jarreck sighed and put down his cards. No matter how much logic claimed that the past could not be undone, it would never keep his mind from dwelling on it.

'What? You folding too?' asked the Japanese-American gentleman, Tamayuya, also known as Yuya for short.

'Let's just take a rain check on this, okay?' said Jarreck.

'The only American game I like – and none of you want to play.' said Yuya, frustrated.

'I'm not the American. You are.'

'Yeah, whatever. You know what really pisses me off? The way they keep us waiting. Waiting and waiting in rooms like this for days – with nothing to do. No women, no alcohol, no nothing.'

Jarreck looked in Mash's direction who was fumbling with a cord connected to an age-old rotator fan. He turned back to Yuya. 'You'll survive.' He changed the topic. 'I heard we're getting some pretty hot-shot researchers on this one. Top of their game.'

'That's unusual. What's the catch? Are we going into a new sector?'

'Nothing out of the ordinary. Southern quadrant...I heard Reuban say something about a rock containing microscopic organisms with something other than DNA.'

'A potential gold mine. No wonder they're interested.' commented Yuya.

'Y'know, I was wondering. Why'd you sign up for this op? Doesn't sound like your kind of field duty.' questioned Jarreck.

'I like being around inquiring minds.'

Jarreck laughed. 'Oh cut the BS, man. You're more into the military transport sector...why change all of sudden?'

Yuya's eyes stopped smiling and he leaned forward. 'You subscribe to urban legends? Extraterrestrial urban legends?'

'I was part of one,' said Jarreck, recalling his encounter aboard the Romulus. 'Remember?'

'Yeah well...this one will knock your interstellar socks off.'

'Pitch it to me.'

'Well you know how there's all this hype with these new discoveries and all,' spoke Yuya as Jarreck nodded. 'I heard that there's sudden excited chatter in a new project that's been going on for a couple decades. And the head of this project is the renowned Doctor Hiromi Omitsu.'

'Our distinguished guest on board this mission?' asked Jarreck, his eyebrows raised.

'You got that right.'

'So what's the project?'

'I dunno – but it must be something pretty damned big for both Weyland Yutani and NASA to throw a black cloth over, don't you think?'

Jarreck leaned back and sighed. 'Come on! I thought you were going to knock my "interstellar" socks off! It's just another damned expedition just like every other one. Research scientists like this cloak and dagger stuff – that's how they get their kicks. Trust me, I was one of them. Just nothing out of the ordinary.' With that, he rose from his chair and walked off.

Yuya looked down at the abandoned cards on the table and spoke to himself. 'Yeah, but I think that right now, the definition of ordinary has changed. Or am I the only one who's aware of this?'