"Personal journal," "Captain Matthew Gideon, continued." "It's now 3 days since our visitors arrived on behalf of Earthgov's political affairs office." "There's apparently some concern about how our work here is being perceived back home." "They've been assigned to... help us." "Before their tour is finished, I may have to kill them, assuming Lieutenant Matheson doesn't beat me to it." "But it's just too light, that's all." "It doesn't have any weight to it." "And, uh... what's that, Kevin?" "Well, it's just..." "All this." "This is an important mission, vital to the salvation of Earth." "People see this ship on the news, in stories that are supposed to reassure everyone about how you're trying to save everyone back home from this terrible plague." "And?" "Well, look around you." "The colors... are too bright." "They don't say "power" to me." "They don't say..." ""importance" to me." "They say... "day at the circus. "" "It'll all have to be red one." "Re-what?" "I'll have my own people do it, of course." "I wouldn't trust anyone else." "We'll choose a color palette that's more... palatable." "Heh." "A palatable palette." "It's a... anyway, you won't even know we're here." "That's right." "Because you won't be." "I can't have strangers messing" "Captain, I understand your concern, but this mission is still under Earth jurisdiction." "Since we're paying the bills for this little hail mary across the stars, we have a right to take whatever steps are necessary to ensure the effort has the right political and social impact." "Impact!" "That's the very word." "The plague is only part of the problem, Captain." "The rest is panic." "We still have 4 years in which to find a cure." "The panic is a problem right now." "We've had..." "Riots back home." "Doomsday cults." "You name it." "The only thing that's calmed them down is knowing this ship is out there looking for a cure." "Now, we have to do everything we can to help make the folks back home feel better about this mission and their chances of survival." "Trust me on this one, Captain." "If anyone knows how to survive political changes, it's me." "So... if a little paint, the proper presentation does the job, great." "I promise we won't get in the way, and at every stage, we welcome your input." "Input?" "Let me tell you something" "Captain, we're picking up something on the long-range scanners." "Source unknown." "This is getting too intense for me." "It's a first-contact situation." "We've handled them before." "I meant the colors." "So if you'll excuse me, I'm going back down to look at the uniforms again." "Unif" "Distance to target." "2,000 kilometers." "Let me see it." "Bring up long-range scanners." "Aye, sir." "Holy... are we getting any life forms?" "Just one." "Barely." "It doesn't make sense." "A ship that big would need a crew of several hundred people." "It does." "We're picking up one life sign, but well over 1,000 organics." "Everyone else on the ship is dead." "It's practically a ghost ship." "Matthew Gideon, Captain." "Attached to the Earth alliance starship Excalibur." "To find a cure to the Drakh plague before it wipes out all life on Earth." "Anywhere I have to." "Who do you serve?" "And who do you trust?" "E.V.A. team standing by, Captain." "Roger that, Lieutenant." "You're clear to proceed." "We're moving out of the air lock now." "I don't understand." "Why are we stopping for this?" "Our mandate is to explore any possible source for a cure." "It doesn't matter if it's a... a lost city, a new civilization, or a derelict alien ship." "If it's a first contact situation, we go in." "But the odds of something like this being of any use... who would've thought to look for penicillin in bread mold?" "I'm not seeing any recognizable markings... no sign of missile or high-energy beam impacts... so my guess is she wasn't hit by raiders or... stand by." "We found something, Captain." "What is it?" "There's a large opening at the back of the ship." "Looks like an explosion." "Then the ship was attacked." "Negative." "The blast damage is coming from the inside out." "Whatever happened here, it happened inside." "Do we move in?" "Affirmative." "But go slow, and don't take any chances." "If you run into trouble, get the hell out." "Will do." "Moving inside." "We appear to be in the engineering section now." "Since the jump engines are back the way we came, this should lead us out into the main body of the ship." "My god." "What is it?" "We've reached the main chamber and found the crew." "It's hard to tell" "They've all been exposed to hard vacuum- but it looks like they've been dead for less than a week." "Dr. Chambers would be able to give you a better estimate than I could." "What killed them?" "It looks like they killed each other." "Mutiny?" "I can't tell." "Maybe." "But in that case, what blew up the engines?" "If it was a mutiny, destroying the ship wouldn't be in the best interests of either side." "Well, maybe it happened during the fight when no one was minding the store." "Maybe." "We've found another passageway." "This one might lead to the command deck." "Moving on." "We've found the source of the signal." "We are registering one life form... and a whole lot of dead ones." "Equalize the pressure in there." "Janey, do we have the right air mix?" "I think so, doctor." "Don't think." "Get it right." "I'm not getting anything on the main scanners, and what I'm getting on the others doesn't make sense." "How long until you can crack the tube?" "We had to make sure it was decontaminated first." "That's done now." "We can send in a team in pressure suits anytime." "Doctor, we're losing him." "Getting massive coronary disruption, total shutdown." "What?" "We just had him stabilized 2 minutes ago." "I know." "I don't understand." "We need a defibrillator team in there." "They're suiting up. 2 minutes." "There isn't time!" "Janey!" "I'm cracking the tube." "Janey!" "Janey!" "It's no good." "We lost him." "Mark the time." "All right." "I want an autopsy asap before the body starts to decompose." "At least we'll get some information out of it." "And you..." "I want you to go through full decontamination procedure before you come out of there." "Including body cavity decon." "Maybe we'll get lucky and find out where your copy of medlab regulations went." "Yes, doctor." "Damn it!" "He shouldn't have died." "We had him stabilized." "One minute he was fine, the next, total systemic shutdown." "It's almost as if he willed himself to die." "It doesn't make sense." "He sent out a distress signal, so he wanted to be saved." "Why choose to die?" "I don't know." "Maybe some cultural imperative against being helped by another race." "Or maybe he didn't like the decor." "Well, he wasn't the first person today to make that observation." "Either way... now we'll never know what happened to that ship." "Not necessarily." "Matheson was able to find some data crystals on board." "With luck, they may have something to say about this." "Maybe." "Matt, I'm sorry." "You did all you could." "Now, one thing- you said that what you were getting on the main scanners didn't make sense." "Yeah." "All I can figure is the equipment needs recalibration." "See, when I looked at his brain wave patterns, he... you ever stand in a room with mirrors on all 4 walls, so the reflections go on into infinity, one into the other into the other?" "Yeah." "Well, that's what I saw when I looked inside his head." "Multiple e. e. g. readouts, and that's simply not possible." "So it's not... a mathematically based language." "Random consonants." "Not good." "Always takes longer." "Excuse me." "Can I have some more of these, whatever they are, please?" "Salted." "I work better with salt." "Did you know that in the 20th century they actually thought that salt was bad for you?" "Listen to the animals, I say." "The lion will sit down with the lamb to share the salt lick." "Good enough for them, good enough for me." "A total lack of pronouns, nothing to compare it against." "Never a rosetta stone when you need one." "Load visual records of Lieutenant Matheson's logs of the alien ship." "Morning, Max." "Captain." "You're up early." "Never went down." "You've been working here all night?" "Why?" "There's a number of things that I hate, Captain." "I hate it when I pull up a piece of skin next to my nail and it catches every time I put it in my pocket and it hurts like a son of a gun." "I hate it when I go to movies with kids in the audience because there's always someone there that tells me I can't kill them when they get loud." "Now, who makes up these rules, anyway?" "And most of all, I hate contradictions." "This is a contradiction." "A big one." "How so?" "Well, I've been analyzing the spoken records of the alien ship all night, and I've-i've narrowed it down to 94 basic letters and... 114 basic language components." "That's good." "Except that the spoken record has nothing in common with the words we found written inside the ship." "Now, either they have one language for speaking and one language for writing, which is highly unlikely, or else- or what?" "Or someone else other than the aliens wrote all this." "But there was no one else there." "Exactly." "So who or what drew these figures?" "I mean, look at it." "Just look at it." "I didn't want to say anything in front of the Captain, he's so resistant to new ideas, but you can't expect anyone to take him seriously wearing this." "Might as well be a mechanic." "It's a standard issue uniform for crews of explorer ships and other deep-range vessels." "It allows freedom of movement, it could be adapted to different climates, it has outside pockets." "An officer doesn't need pockets." "He can have people carry his things for him." "Where's the rest of it?" "Come, come, come, come, quickly, quickly." "Blue is wrong for these." "Here, take a look at this." "Later." "What?" "But we've just begun sorting" "I have more important things to do right now." "More important?" "What's more important than the right clothes for the right job, the right style for the right... oh, I try." "Goodness knows I try, but it's just so hard some days." "Why, yes, we were gonna all, you know, take the transport and leave and..." "Kira?" "Kira..." "Yes!" "Yes!" "I knew that would work." "This is the Captain's log, you see." "What would a Captain talk about more than his ship?" "His ship." "So the equivalent word for "ship"" "would be the most common word in the log." "Once you've established that, then you go to "my ship," "their ship,"" "and it all starts falling into place." "Ahh..." "God, I'm good." "Display last records, text only." "Holy..." "Eilerson to Gideon." "Gideon here." "I'll meet you in the conference room in 10 minutes." "I have found something." "Hold that door!" "Help me!" "Hold that door!" "Eilerson, what the hell's going on down there?" "I've had reports of weapons fire." "We got a guard down in here." "He's been shot, and we will need medics." "What happened?" "There's no time." "Just listen." "You've got to close down all the decks." "Seal the air doors, turn off the bullet car." "Decompress the tubes if you have to, but you got seal off all the decks." "Don't let anyone out except me!" "Make sure this car gets out." "How's the guard?" "On life support, but I'm not getting any brain activity." "We can keep his body alive, but that's about all." "Look, what's this all about?" "What happened down there?" "Why are the decks sealed off?" "Max?" "As I was just telling the Captain, we have been invaded." "According to the records of the alien ship, they picked up a probe, they brought it on board." "The only thing inside was a high-energy source, organic in nature." "It disappeared after they opened the probe, and that's when people started changing." "Changing how?" "Physically?" "Mentally." "Inside." "Apparently, the energy contains an alien life force that divides and subdivides each time it moves into a new host." "It's-it's transferred... it's transferred by touch... from one person to another." "In a matter of days, it took over half of their crew." "That would explain the multiple brain wave patterns on the alien we found." "Apparently, this alien presence tends to stay in groups, in-in colonies." "They take control of one area, and then they move on to the next." "By sealing off the decks, we can control how fast this thing spreads." "Good thinking, Max." "Thank you, but not my idea." "In these records I'm decoding, it was the first thing that the Captain chose to do when he realized that this was taking over his ship." "He still thought that he could contain it." "All he did was buy himself some time." "In the end, he decided the only way to stop this thing was to destroy the ship and kill everyone on board." "and if we don't figure out a way to stop it... we may have to do the same thing." "Everything seems normal." "Deck 8 looks clear." "All right." "Open up a P.A. channel on 8." "Channel open." "This is the Captain." "You are all ordered to remain in your quarters until told otherwise." "Refrain from any contact with other members of the crew until the current situation is resolved." "Activating recorder on decks 9 and 10." "Is that the same writing that you found on the alien ship?" "Aye, sir." "Damn." "Eilerson was right about all this." "I hate it when he's right." "He'll be insufferable for days." "Has there been any sign of the crew?" "Negative." "Either they're staying in their quarters or they're deliberately avoiding the recorder." "Wait." "Wait, hold up." "Hello, Captain." "I was wondering when you'd show up." "We should talk." "About what?" "About negotiating a peaceful way out of this." "Because otherwise, neither you nor any of your crew are going to get out of this alive." "Max." "Are you ok?" "Not really." "But better than him." "Is there anything we can do for him?" "Anything at all?" "I'm afraid not." "He took a shot to the brainstem that severed all" "All we can do is keep his body alive." "He was protecting me when this happened." "He stepped right into the line of fire." "He didn't flinch, he didn't think twice." "He just did it." "That's what they're trained to do." "Intellectually I know that, but no one has ever..." "Saved my life like this before, offering to exchange his own life for mine." "I've been standing here wondering, if he had known the subject of his attention, whether he would still consider the exchange worthwhile." "I don't think any of them can look at it that way." "They look for an opportunity to serve, to protect us and the mission." "That's what he was here for in the first place." "They join the military looking to serve with honor." "He did that." "You know, no one's even told me his name." "Greenberg." "Stuart Greenberg." "It's a good name." "Yes, it is." "Did you contact Welles," "Give him the location of our talk?" "I did." "We've got security personnel welding shut the air lock now." "I still think it's too dangerous." "It's a calculated risk." "I've been studying the report of the attack on Eilerson." "If they could take control of someone just based on line of sight or proximity, they would've done so." "But you can see them reaching out, transferring the alien presence by touch." "As long as we make sure that they can't touch me..." "I should be fine." "Well, it's the "should" that bothers me." "It's not 100%." "Nothing ever is, Lieutenant." "All right." "Let's get this done." "I'm here." "Captain... good of you to come." "Who..." "What are you?" "We don't have names as you do." "There is the one, the beginning of us, and we who are the shadows of that beginning." "As our race grew, we began to send out probes that would allow us to colonize other worlds, not by traveling ourselves, but making those places... just like us." "So instead of terraforming the planet, you terraform the people... pass along your race memories and make them into colonies." "And what they have, we have." "Why risk ourselves when we can program others to become us?" "So what do you want with us?" "Transportation." "That's all." "There are several inhabited worlds in this area." "Take us to one of them, and we'll leave peacefully." "You can go on your way." "While you take over their world." "That would be the inevitable result." "Once our kind is introduced into the population, there is no way of stopping us without killing everyone." "And we would not allow that to happen." "Our instinct for self-preservation is quite strong." "So, in other words, exchange someone else's world for my ship." "It seems a fair trade." "No deal." "The price tag is too high." "I don't think you have a choice, Captain." "You've sealed us off, but we're still here." "If you starve us, you'll only kill the poor, innocent crewmembers whose bodies we inhabit." "If you send in your troops, they will leave asourtroops." "Your only way out is to make us someone else's problem." "I'll think about it." "Captain." "I suggest you not try anything rash." "The Captain of the last ship thought he could stop us." "He failed." "He didn't understand that from the moment we arrive, we have the upper hand." "I don't know." "Looks more to me like a Mexican standoff." "After all, you're stuck on this ship same as we are." "Anything you do to us... you do to yourselves." "Oh, not necessarily, as you'll discover for yourself soon enough if you don't give us what we're asking for." "Do you mind?" "Sorry." "I thought you were supposed to be staying in your quarters." "In the middle of a crisis?" "I've got to do something, get involved, make decisions." "Lighter or darker here - what do you think?" "I think that you're in my way." "What is this, anyway?" "It's a record of my visit to the alien ship." "Hmm." "Strange, isn't it?" "What?" "Well, I'm a designer." "I think in terms of lines, forms, direction." "How the image adds up to something more." "And?" "Well, look." "All those aliens touching each other like that." "They were fighting." "No, I've seen fighting, and that's not it." "They form a chain leading up to that tube, the back row touching the one in front of it, and on and on to the end." "We know the alien force was spread by touch." "Yes..." "But the numbers get smaller the closer you move to the tube, until there's just... one." "Interesting." "Dr. Chambers saw multiple e. e. g. readouts in the alien we brought back." "So the personalities are all in one body again." "So there you are." "If touch is how the genie gets out of the bottle, then maybe touch is how the genie gets back in the bottle again." "Maybe." "But we still need to figure out how to get the alien forms off the ship willingly." "That's not going to be easy." "Just show them this color scheme." "If that doesn't drive them off, nothing will." "Lieutenant." "Given what I've just heard, it seems likely that our unwelcome guests are going to make a move sometime soon." "We've sealed off the decks, but there's a lot they can do to hurt us, even from inside." "I had the same thought." "This deck alone gives them access to helm and steering controls." "They could immobilize us until we agree to take them where they want to go." "Exactly." "So we have to limit their access to critical areas." "Now, life support for these decks are still controlled from here." "If we can kill the heating systems in all the areas we need to protect, then we can herd them together in one central area over here." "It'll take a while." "We'll have to override the safety protocols." "But once we cut the heating system, it'll get real cold there real fast." "Then I suggest you get to it." "Aye, sir." "Sir, Mr. Welles is on the line." "Put him through." "I told you there would be consequences if you did not comply with our demands, Captain." "Your actions would indicate you don't take us seriously." "Let me change that for you." "Wait-wait!" "Wait!" "No!" "Aah!" "You son of a bitch, I swear to god I'll" "You'll what?" "Kill this body?" "We'll just move into another one." "As long as one of us goes on, we all go on." "Our mistake the last time was allowing the Captain his freedom for too long." "We don't intend to make the same mistake twice." "You have exactly 10 minutes in which to surrender yourself to us." "If you refuse, we'll begin killing one of your people every 5 minutes until you change your mind." "Decide quickly, Captain." "You now have 9 minutes." "Tell security to unlock the bullet car." "I want to get in there as fast as possible." "Sir, I object- and I object to sitting here letting my people get murdered." "Sir, once you're inside, they can take you over same as they did everybody else." "I may have a way to stall, buy us some time, but not a lot." "So we need to figure a way out of this." "We'll have to pull out plan B." "What's plan B?" "We can't afford to let these things get to an inhabited planet." "If we can't stop them... if it looks like they're going to gain control of the ship," "I'm authorizing self-destruct." "One way or another, this ends here." "Yes, sir." "Welles to Gideon - you now have 4 minutes left." "I know." "30 seconds to spare." "I'm a punctual kind of guy." "Does our presence offend you?" "Yes." "But that's not the reason." "You deliberately precipitated the crisis in medbay so that she'd have to enter without a protective suit." "So whatever you are, I figure you can't get through this any more than you can pass through a closed door." "Very perceptive, Captain." "Flesh is our conduit, our biochemical door into the soul and the mind." "So, if you don't mind removing that... not a chance." "Not as long as I have this." "If you kill us, then you kill your own crew." "Which rather defeats the point of coming." "I don't have to kill you." "All I have to do is blow away the kneecap of anyone who tries it." "Then we can fix the damage later, after you're gone." "And meanwhile, you're, uh... stuck here with people that you can't use in a fight." "As I said, perceptive." "But there is one small problem with your logic." "In less than an hour, your air supply will run out." "Then you'll have to take off that suit... or die." "Even you need air, Captain." "That's true." "We all do, don't we?" "As Mr. Eilerson says..." ""The air is human. "" "What is he talking about?" "That's a cliche." "I never use cliches." "I never said that in my entire life." "If I didn't feel for his position," "I'd consider suing." "Wait a minute." "The saying is, "To err is human", not "The air is human"." "Does he know he's being monitored?" "Affirmative." "But they've got the frequency as well, so they're probably listening in." "Then maybe that was meant for us." "If he's figured something out and he couldn't say it openly, he'd have to say it in a way they wouldn't notice." "But what does it mean?" ""The air is human"." "On the other ship, the bodies were pointed toward the cryotube, as if they were sending the alien force back into one person as the ship depressurized." "Well, it's obvious they need air to survive just like everyone else." "If their host bodies die of oxygen deprivation, they die as well." "But how does that help us?" "Oh, hell." "I've got it." "Sarah, how long does the average human last without oxygen?" "4-5 minutes, no more." "Then you start to get brain damage." "That'll have to be enough." "Come on, we gotta get to medbay." "What's in medbay?" "If I'm right, it's our ticket out of here." "Is there any way to depressurize the decks that these things have taken over?" "Mr. Eilerson, there are E.V.A. suits on the main deck." "If even one of them gets to them, all we'll have succeeded in doing is killing 200 people." "Trust me." "Computer, how much oxygen left?" "There are 24 minutes remaining of E.V.A. oxygen." "Come on." "Come on, figure it out." "I repeat, stand by to override safety controls and depressurize decks 7 through 9." "All medical personnel stand by." "Security details to all air locks." "Do not allow anyone passage without challenge." "Prepare to crack air lock on deck 9." "Use of deadly force is authorized." "I repeat-use of deadly force authorized." "Decompression alert." "Repeat - decompression alert." "No." "Noooo!" "I told them they couldn't stop me." "I told them." "Hey, something's wrong." "I... can't move." "I can't move." "I can't move!" "Don't... we can work this out." "Don't do this." "We can work together." "I know what you're looking for." "I know where you can find it!" "Don't do this." "Don't do this!" "Lieutenant." "Yes, sir?" "You know what to do." "Aye, sir." "Fire." "Beginning repressurization." "Med teams report immediately to decks 9 and 10." "Repeat-all med teams to decks 9 and 10 a. s. a. p." "We've secured the ship, Captain." "Good." "Now, before you let anyone else on board, be sure the thing is decontaminated" "From stem to stern." "I don't want this happening all over again." "Roger that, Captain." "We'll crack the database and let you know if we find anything we can use." "Good luck." "Move us away." "Yes, sir." "Captain." "Mr. Welles." "Feeling better?" "Still a little weak around the knees, but yes, thanks to you and your crew." "We're about to head out." "It's a bit more excitement than I'm used to." "But before that," "I'd like to thank you properly." "Kevin?" "While we were waiting for the other ships," "I finished my designs." "We had them stop off en route to pick up the new uniforms" "So you could have them right away." "New uniforms?" "I didn't want to wait a minute longer than was necessary." "Huh." "It's got power, presence, strength." "It'll blend in with the ship so you're all more a part of it." "It's official, dignified." "It's everything you could ask for in a uniform." "Mr. Welles... we've already approved the designs with Earthforce personnel back home, and they've given the go-ahead." "Wear it with pride, Captain." "That's an order." "Take a look at that collar." "Yeah, I see it." "I'm not sure I'll be able to breathe in that thing." "Breathe when you're off-duty." "Yes, sir." "I wanted to thank you for your help, for doing what had to be done." "I keep hoping that he would have approved of using his body like that." "I think so." "This way, he not only saved my life, he saved everyone on the ship." "And you feel better about that." "A little." "You're such a puzzle to me, Max." "On one level, you've got an ego that's as big as a galactic core." "But at other times, like this..." "I hear the voice of someone desperately unsure of himself." "It's such a contradiction." "Not really." "Not when you consider what I do compared to what they do." "The most I risk is a paper cut, usually." "But them, they risk it all, and... in the end, who's to speak for them?" "Gideon." "And I don't envy him the job." "Power, dignity, presence." "I look like a bellhop." "Begin recording letter." "Confirmed." "Dear Mrs. Greenberg," "I was your son Stuart's commanding officer." "I wanted you to know that he gave his life in the pursuit of his duty." "His actions saved the lives of over 300 of his fellow crewmen." "I have submitted his name for a commendation." "He was... he was a good man, Mrs. Greenberg, and all the commendations won't make up for his absence at the dinner table." "But you should know that he was a brave man who did what needed to be done, and we all owe him our lives." "My sincere condolences on your loss, and should you feel the need to talk, please... do not hesitate to contact me." "Dear mr." "Arkham, your son David gave his life in the performance of his duty." "I was his commanding officer."