The hallway leading to the cryochamber felt longer than Kael remembered. Each step sounded too sharp, too hollow, echoing back at him like footsteps that didn't belong to him alone. The emergency lights pulsed in slow intervals, painting the corridor red, then black, then red again like a warning heartbeat.
The ship wasn't just dark now.
It felt… watching.
Kael kept the plasma cutter raised as he approached the door. The cold mist seeping from the cryochamber made the metal floor slick beneath his boots. He forced himself forward, jaw clenched, breath steady but thin.
"AI," he whispered, "status on the creature?"
A crackle of static.
Then:
"…movement… intermittent… I cannot track it reliably."
"Is it still inside the chamber?"
"I do not know."
Kael exhaled through his teeth. "And Pod 04?"
"Biological activity continues. Stronger now."
His chest tightened. A strange pressure settled behind his ribs, like someone gripping him from the inside. He hadn't looked at Pod 04 since the day they retrieved the body the only body found after the crew vanished.
No one else had been recovered.
The door to the cryochamber stood slightly open, frost creeping around the frame in delicate veins. A thin stream of cold vapor curled out across the floor.
Kael pushed the door aside and stepped in.
A cold wave washed over him. His breath misted in the air. The chamber lights flickered weakly, illuminating rows of tall pods. Frost coated their transparent surfaces like ice over a graveyard of glass coffins.
Except most of the pods were empty.
And one the fourth on the left glowed faintly from within.
Kael's heart kicked hard against his ribs.
Pod 04.
He stepped closer, each footfall crunching softly against the frozen floor.
The pod vibrated faintly a soft, rhythmic hum, like a heartbeat syncing with his own. Frost cracked along the edges of the glass, spiderwebbing outward in delicate fractures.
Kael swallowed. "AI… confirm biological data."
"Life signs detected," the AI whispered. "Cellular activity… shifting."
"Is it human?"
Silence.
Then:
"…mostly."
He didn't like that answer.
Kael reached the pod and touched the glass. His fingers burned from the cold. A face lay inside beneath layers of frost eyes closed, skin pale, hair drifting slightly in the thick cryo-fluid. He recognized the features instantly.
Even through the frost.
Even after months.
Because he had stared at this face for hours the day he found the body. Stood here until the ache in his chest felt like it would break him open.
Lieutenant Ren Hale.
His second-in-command.
His closest friend.
The man who died saving him.
Except…
Ren's eyes twitched.
Kael stumbled back, breath catching.
The frost cracked again louder. A line splintered across the glass. The internal lights flickered, turning the cryo-fluid a deep, dark red for a moment before stabilizing.
"AI," Kael whispered, "what is happening to him?"
"Cellular structure is… rewriting."
"Rewriting into what?"
"I cannot classify it."
Kael's stomach twisted. He glanced around the cryochamber. The creature was nowhere in sight. But that didn't comfort him. It could move through vents, slip through shadows, cling to ceilings like a parasite.
It could be anywhere.
He looked back at Ren. The frost melted faster, revealing more of the face
A twitch.
Another.
Fingers shifting inside the fluid.
A slow opening of the eyes.
Kael froze.
Ren's eyes weren't the warm brown he remembered. They glowed pale white the same color as the creature's.
Kael lifted the plasma cutter.
"Don't," a voice whispered.
Kael jerky turned, cutter raised
Nothing.
Silence.
The voice had come from inside the pod.
"Kael."
The sound was distorted, layered with static, like two voices speaking through the same throat. But the tone… the tone belonged to Ren.
"Open… it…" the voice breathed.
Kael shook his head slowly. His chest felt tight enough to crack.
"Ren," he whispered, "you're dead."
The eyes inside the pod blinked slowly, glowing brighter.
"Not… anymore."
Kael felt the blood drain from his face.
He stepped back. "AI. Lock this pod. Now."
The AI didn't answer for a full second.
Then:
"…I can't…"
Kael's pulse spiked. "Why not?"
"It's overriding… every command…"
A metallic cracking sound tore through the room.
The pod's surface bulged outward.
Kael raised his weapon. "Stay inside that pod, Ren. Don't make me—"
The glass shattered.
A blast of freezing vapor exploded outward as Ren Hale or whatever was left of him lurched forward with inhuman speed. Cryo-fluid spilled across the floor in a wave of freezing cold. Kael staggered back, slipping slightly, catching himself before he fell.
Ren collapsed to his hands and knees, coughing violently. Thick cryo-fluid dripped from his hair, his skin, his half-torn uniform. His breath came out in short, sharp gasps, condensation rising in pale mist.
But his eyes those weren't Ren's eyes.
They glowed like twin stars of cold, unnatural light.
"Ren," Kael said, voice low, "stay where you are."
Ren lifted his head.
"Captain…" His voice cracked. "Help… me…"
It was Ren's voice.
But behind it deeper, quieter something else echoed.
Kael tightened his grip on the cutter. "What did that thing do to you?"
Ren's limbs twitched violently. He pressed his hands to the floor as if trying to hold himself together.
"I… I saw it… in the dark…" he whispered. "When we were taken…"
Kael froze.
"You saw what?"
Ren's breathing grew harsher. "It… changed us…"
"Us?" Kael repeated sharply.
Ren's whole body jerked.
Then he lifted his head and Kael saw panic in those glowing eyes. Real panic.
"Kael… run—"
A metallic screech tore through the cryochamber vents.
The creature was still here.
And it wasn't alone.
The lights went out again.
And in the dark, Kael heard not one voice…
But many.
Whispering his name.