She had huddled in a corner, bringing her knees up to her chest. Her uncle had told her before that the thermostat automatically turned up to about 30C after the cryo-chambers were open, but she was not convinced. It was much colder than it had ever been. An icy feeling spread through Helen's hands, causing her to place them underneath her knees for warmth.

She was thinking of her father – who she hadn't seen in over five months – ever since her parents' divorce. Sometimes it made her sad to think that they didn't seem to have the stereotypical father-daughter relationship she would have preferred. But he was...how would she put it, an interesting man. He could be exceptionally distant at times. Like the time when she got sent off to the principal's office after she was found skipping her physics class. Her mother brought her home, fuming, lecturing...the usual recant of her Miranda rights. Her father, however, thought nothing of it – leaving such behavior to the logistics of inexplicable adolescent behavior. Mother, of course, was contrastingly angry – and after Helen's punishment had been duly issued, went straight after her marital counterpart. Yet another heated argument ensued.

"So is that all you have to say then, Michael? Is "kids will be kids" your excuse for Helen's nonchalance?" Her voice was calm, a dangerous prelude of what could follow if she became angrier. "Perhaps the next time...when you catch her with some Jack Daniels in her hand, you can let her go and tell me she's only experimenting. Or maybe when she has some weed – then you can say it's because she needs to relax – take time out from all the stress."

"Celia...she's almost thirteen. Tell me, honestly, that you were perfect at that age and I'll take everything back."

"That's right. Make me into the bad guy. Make me evil because all I care about is my daughter's welfare and her future."

"You're not the bad guy..." said Michael, sighing.

"All I want –" she choked back something building up in her throat, "...All I want is for you to give a damn about your family! And you don't!"

Helen watched silently, from the open crack of the door – watched as her mother threw her hands up in frustration.

"So that's what it's all about then. You want me to work extra hard – not that I'm not putting in as much time for my family as it is –"

"Michael, bringing in the money into this house isn't my interpretation of spending time with your family. I don't give a shit about the money. I don't!"

"Just like you don't give a shit about your new fitted kitchen, huh?" retorted Michael.

"Damn you!" she shouted. Then calming down as if realizing something, she spoke quietly. "Let's not beat around the bush. I'm sick of us hiding the real issue with triviality! Michael...tell me honestly. All these excuses you make up for this...this attitude of yours. Are they lies? You want to let Helen get away because you don't want to deal with her."

"What do you mean?" said Helen's father, knowing exactly what his wife was getting to.

"Are we a burden to you?"

Silence.

Celia continued. "I take it that that's a yes. If you don't contradict me, I'll take it that what I'm saying has been the truth all along."

Michael looked up at his wife's eyes briefly and then turned around and walked away.

Helen leaned her head back up against the wall of the Aurelius. Perhaps "distant" was an understatement then. But he was interesting. Possibly not in the way that one would imagine – he didn't have a unique occupation, he didn't have unique tastes...he seemed to be far more complex than that. She recalled him sitting next to her on the couch at home one evening, talking to her in his own way. That was probably the first and the last real conversation they'd ever had.

"I like what you've done with your hair..." he had said suddenly, nodding towards her.

She touched it lightly and frowned. "I've tied it back, dad. There's nothing different about it."

"Helen, what kind of a person are you?" he said, out of the blue.

"What?" Helen had given him a befuddled, perplexed look. What was so bad about her hair?

"No...no, I mean...your character. Do you think you're personality has already been defined for you, or do you believe that it develops once you leave the nest?"

What a question. "I...I guess the latter really. Or maybe a bit of both."

"And do you think that once you have – as some call it – "found yourself", that that personality is now set in stone, and can never be altered?"

"Dad, this is intense stuff."

He had grinned at her. "But it's not being graded. Just let me know what you think."

"Okay...yeah, I guess once I know who I am, and what I believe in...nothing can change me. Are you going to tell me I'm wrong now?"

"If I did, would that bother you?"

"Yeah." She had admitted, truthfully.

He sighed. "Your personality – on the outside – can change dramatically, usually due to a traumatic or emotional event. But once you're you – your true self is only strengthened by shocking events. I believe that's true...because I've experienced it."

"Where?" Helen has asked.

"It doesn't matter. I can't tell you the answers. If I did, you probably wouldn't take such lessons to heart. The best lessons learned are the ones that sting."

Reuban and Lexington laid Jarreck down on a long seat. Reuban placed his fingers gently on Jarreck's neck to take his pulse.

'I'm okay now...' said Jarreck, looking up at his friend.

Reuban nodded. 'Just give yourself some time to kick back into action. Sit still for a while.'

He stood back up and breathed out. Regan was dead. Regan was dead. The words were certainly taking their time to sink in. Under usual emergency conditions – like a computer navigation malfunction, or a damaged hull – the first thing they'd all do was to latch onto a receiving frequency and send out an S.O.S. signal. There communications line was down now. And a man was dead. Should they be grieving? Should they recover his body and hold some kind of informal farewell? He didn't feel like it. He was afraid. And he didn't want to deal with his emotions at this point in time. He wondered if the others did.

Reuban looked around the room slowly. Omitsu was standing against a portion of the wall, massaging her temples. Yuya was talking with Barnaby, although it may have appeared as if it was Barnaby doing most of the talking...Yuya had a vacant expression on his pallid face. And Lexington was walking over to Helen with a green blanket in his hands. He watched silently as the girl accepted it, and spoke to Lexington as he sat down beside her.

'He didn't mean to kill anyone, you know. He couldn't have – he doesn't have it in him.' said Helen, looking up at Lexington.

'Jarreck?' Lexington smiled sadly. 'I guess maybe you're right. Maybe what he was doing before was caused by sheer paranoia – nothing more.'

'But that's because of what he went through on the other ship...and even then, I really don't think he caused it. I don't think he's crazy.'

Lextington looked hard at the girl. 'Perhaps you're right. But it's a whole different kettle of fish now, Helen. We know for certain that Jarreck couldn't have done this.'

'Then who...?'

Lexington didn't answer. Instead, he looked towards Reuban, who seemingly understood his compatriot's nonverbal message and addressed everyone in the room.

'I know that all of us are exhausted. So let me cut to the chase here...our current course to earth has been altered because emergency mode on board the Aurelius automatically overrides manual settings. So our next step is to figure out what triggered all of this and-'

Barnaby cut Reuban off. 'It was that larva inside of Regan. It burst out. Reuban, I think I might understand now.' He swallowed before continuing. 'Maybe what we're looking at is a...kind of fungus. There's a species of fungus common to the Amazonian region that infects fire ants through inhalation of its spores. It somehow manipulates the neural activity of the ants, causing them to climb up to elevated reagions. When this is accomplished, the fungus bursts through the creature, releasing its spores to a larger radial area than if it simply did it's job on lower ground.'

'No, if that happened-' began Lexington.

'Wait a second, just hear me out. Whatever came out of Regan must have released it spores. Then we must assume that because all of us were in the vicinity – we're infected.' finished Barnaby.

'Not a fungus, Barnaby. Can't be.' spoke Omitsu. 'Fungi don't lay eggs. What we have here is a typical parasite.'

'Okay. Say it's a parasite – like we did before. It laid the egg. The thing inside the egg hatches and...um...inserts its DNA or whatever into the host.' Barnaby gestured with his hands, while simultaneously continuing to think. 'Then it exits the host-'

'It exits the host violently.' muttered Yuya.

Barnaby continued. 'After leaving the host where does it go?'

'To lay more eggs.' said Helen suddenly. 'And start all over again.'

'Impossible. That's impossible.' said Reuban. 'Whatever left Regan's chest – it was small. There's no way that thing can lay an egg that big.'

'Maybe the egg grows in size.' said Barnaby.

'It would have to have an incredible amount of nourishment stored within.' said Lexington as he shook his head. 'Energetically inefficient. Evolution would select the most convenient method for it to reproduce, and if I were that creature, I wouldn't put all my eggs into one basket – pardon the pun. What I mean to say is that why deposit all this food into the egg in order for it to grow large? It could be destroyed or killed...and all its efforts would have been wasted. What I would do is to leave my host and then-' Lexington stopped short. The realization hit him suddenly like a gale in full force.

Barnaby finished his thought for him. '-grow larger.'

Everyone was silent.

Jarreck watched the conversation unfold in stunned silence. His mind, much quicker on the uptake now, was trying desperately to keep up, to fill in the gaps. Obviously, they'd brought something aboard the ship. He recalled Helen mentioning something about Omitsu taking care of an egg.

He shut his eyes trying to think. Somehow, the entity within the egg had infected Regan and eventually killed him. Not that simple, thought Jarreck. How could something that horrible be so simple?

He spoke suddenly, breaking the silence. 'So it's getting bigger. And it's loose on the ship. How do you know it didn't die when it was exposed to our atmosphere?'

'Because it adapted to ours remarkably well. It managed to infect Regan without any problems.' answered Omitsu.

'Someone has to go out there,' Jarreck pointed to what lay behind the closed doors, 'and kill it.'

'We gotta reboot the computer first.' said Yuya. 'We're drifting off into unknown territory. Don't want to drift too far off.'

'Is it hostile? Maybe it isn't...once it's fully developed.' said Omitsu.

'Bullshit. Anything that is born in that fashion has to be a fully fledged axe murderer once it's all grown up.' contradicted Barnaby.

Jarreck swallowed. He noticed that his breathing had begun to grow slightly faster. Not labored like it was before. But it didn't seem to be the results of his waning drowsiness. He was afraid. His old nightmare was recurring in real life. Oh God. Everyone was going to die again...he could feel it.

Jarreck clenched his fists in an attempt to remain in control. Keep it together, man...Keep it together. He took a deep breath and looked around him, when suddenly it struck him. This was different. This situation seemed wholly different. Everybody in the room – Omitsu included – they had banded together – as impossible and unlikely as it sounded. The arguments held before; they'd seemed to have forgotten. Everyone seemed to have one objective in mind. Survival.

'No one's obviously going to go anywhere without weapons.' said Jarreck. 'We can't afford to lose anyone.'

'But where're the weapons?' asked Barnaby, opening out his palms.

'Jarreck can make them.' Yuya said, looking at his friend.

Jarreck looked back, understanding. That was Yuya's form of an apology, for what had happened earlier.

He nodded. Apology accepted.'Okay. Depends on what we've got here though...which room are we in?'

'The bunker room. Nothing in here but dried food and some age-old magazines.' explained Reuban, looking around.

'Canned, dried food?' asked Jarreck.

Reuban nodded.

'So we have can openers...blades, knives, anything?' persisted Jarreck.

'Blades – yeah...from the electric openers.' answered Reuban.

'Great. Let's get to work.'

'I feel like Neanderthal man.' quipped Yuya, gripping a lengthy wooden pole with a sharp metallic blade on one end. 'Couldn't you have come up with something a little more sophisticated? I don't feel safe going out with this...um...spear.' Despite the humor, Yuya gripped his weapon tightly. He noticed that nobody had laughed, or smiled. In fact, he'd felt his joke fall flat on its face himself. He couldn't help it. Sometimes, humor was an outlet. But in this instance, it didn't seem to be doing much good.

They had agreed that if anyone was to go out – it would be in pairs. That way, it would be difficult to get lost...or trapped without aid. Lexington wanted to get the ship's computer back under manual control. Reuban had opted to go find themselves more trustworthy weapons, something that they could readily defend themselves with should the need arise. So the two had reached a compromise. Lexington would go with Yuya to the control room, whilst Jarreck and Reuban would go down below the main deck to the storage lockers. The others; Helen, Omitsu and Barnaby were to remain behind. If the paired groups did not return within three hours, they were to come after them.

Jarreck watched as Reuban gave Helen a quick hug.

'Let's get going...' said Yuya, shifting from foot to foot. 'Can't say I'm entirely eager about this, but I'd rather get it over with ASAP.'

Lexington nodded and punched his hand on the button next to the doors. They slid open and the four of them stepped out.

As they walked down the long corridor, Lexington squinted ahead of him and frowned. About ten yards ahead of the pair, the hallway seemed darker, more ominous. The clinking of his feet against the metallic floor stopped, causing his counterpart to halt alongside him.

'What is it?' asked Yuya quietly.

'It's probably no big deal. The lights are out – there, ahead of us.' pointed Lexington.

'No shit.' breathed Yuya. 'The Aurelius is brand new; NASA had her mechanics check her out before we took off...'

'Machines aren't perfect.' replied Lexington as he gestured for Yuya and himself to continue walking. 'Probably nothing. Sometimes the gases from the ducts might leak, condense and then cause a short in the electrical wiring.'

They continued to walk in silence. Yuya glanced at Lexington, wondering how the man seemed to know his way around so well aboard such a large ship. Perhaps it had something to do with his knowledge of machinery, technology layouts and such. Really, thought Yuya, the man was quite the technological genius. Sometimes overly eager but-

Something caught his eye. It was up about four yards ahead, and he strained to see in the waning light.

Lexington must have apparently noticed his alarm, because he paused too, and then suddenly chuckled.

'Imagination and fear can really wreck your nerves...it's just the portable generator. We must've left it sitting out here before. Looks just like the boogey man I saw behind my dresser when I was five.'

Yuya sighed, relieved. 'Had me going there too...I thought-'

He was cut short by a sound...a combination of clinking on metal and something being dragged along its cold surface.

'Maybe it's Jarreck and Reuban,' whispered Yuya. 'Are the storage lockers nearby?'

'No. Below deck.'

The noise grew louder. It took a minute for this implication to hit home.

The two pointed their makeshift spears towards the corridor they had come down.

'Behind us?' asked Lexington.

'I don't know,'

'I don't like waiting here...' spoke Lexington quietly.

He looked over at Yuya in the semi-darkness, and saw the growing fear in his eyes. The two men acknowledged understanding and suddenly ran, leg muscles working hard, down the opposite end of the corridor.

Their retreat seemed endless. Before, stealth and silence was their secondary weapon. But now, Yuya didn't care if they woke the dead. He panted as he ran, dragging the goddamn spear across the floor. The corridor neared its end. He could almost see the doors leading to the main lounge ahead of him. Please God, please God – let me make it. He counted. Five meters to go. Four. Three. Two. One. He pounded hard on the opening button and flung himself into the room.

As he watched the door slam shut behind him, his breath caught in his throat. Lexington was gone.