To Sleep in a Sea of Stars

The next morning, Neghar, the team’s pilot, takes Kira to investigate the organic matter. Kira accesses her memories through her overlays, implants that allow her to view recorded memories, information, news, and more. She watches memories of her family, knowing they will not be happy about her settling far from Weyland but excited about starting her own life on Adra.

Kira finds the organic matter, a patch of lichen, and analyzes it. She also finds the drone that identified the lichen, which crashed near a strange rock formation. She realizes that the formation is atypical, and while trying to collect samples, she falls through a hole. She finds herself in a chamber that appears to have been formed by intelligent aliens. To this point, only one alien artifact has been found by humans, the Great Beacon on Talos VII, and they had never discovered who built it.

Kira is trapped in the chamber. The walls and ceiling feature carved lines that look like a circuit board. A glowing pedestal is inscribed with lines as well. She blows dust out of a basin sitting atop the pedestal, and the dust flows down and across the floor, covering her foot and immobilizing her. It moves up her leg and covers her, penetrating her skinsuit, filling her nose and mouth, until she finally loses consciousness.

Kira wakes up. She is in sickbay and does not remember how she got there. Alan tells her that she has been in cryogenic sleep for four weeks. She remembers what happened to her and begins to panic. The crew tell her that Neghar saved her and has a slight cough but otherwise seems unharmed. They have both been in quarantine. She asks the team about her discovery, but the team wants her report first. They have remained on Adra because protocol demands radio silence when an alien presence is discovered.

The Extenuating Circumstances, a United Military Command (UMC) ship, has arrived in Adra’s system. The UMC is the military arm of The League, humanity’s interstellar governing body, and is unpopular because they prioritize Earth’s needs and disregard other colonized planets. The UMC places the Adra team under an indefinite gag order and confiscates their data. In addition, the UMC has quarantined Adra and its entire system, Sigma Draconis, telling the public that a pathogen has been found.

Finally, the team is given permission to leave Adra. That night, Kira has a dream that she is flying in a system with seven planets that look diseased. She feels sadness and fear and is struck by one of the rays of light. She screams and wakes up, as does Alan. They hear shouting and find the team surrounding Neghar, who is coughing up blood. She spits something up, and it moves. Kira scratches at her skin, which is burning, and then sees something twitch under her skin and begins screaming in pain.

Dark lines run under Kira’s skin, and her skin bursts above them. Tendrils with spikes burst from her skin and flail about the sick bay. She loses consciousness, and when she wakes up, everyone is dead, impaled by the spikes coming from her body. Kira thinks she is dying and then loses consciousness again.

Kira wakes up in a tall tube as she is being examined by robotic arms. She remembers what happened and looks down at her body. It is black and covered with a fibrous material. When she tries to bite it off, it tastes like stone and metal. No matter how hard she bites, she cannot damage it and cannot feel the pain through it. When she starts to panic, the robotic arm injects her, and she loses consciousness again.

When she is awake, she realizes that an alien creature has bonded with her, which is a situation xenobiologists dread. She tries to access her overlays, but they do not work. The alien, or xeno, has infiltrated her nervous system—she can feel her own touch as if there is no barrier between her fingers and her skin. The xeno covers her body and extends around her head, covering her hair. Her face and neck are all that is exposed.

She realizes that she must be on the Extenuating Circumstances when a hologram appears of a woman in uniform. She introduces herself as Major Tschetter and tells Kira that four of the Adra crew, including Neghar, have survived. The thing Neghar coughed up attached itself to Kira’s xeno as if it were rejoining a larger organism, but Neghar is unharmed. Tschetter interviews Kira about the event, and Kira asks why they did not cryofreeze her for quarantine. They tried, Tschetter tells her, but the organism rejected the chemicals. Kira has been isolated in a part of the ship that can be jettisoned if need be. Since the xeno destroyed her overlays, Kira asks to record messages to her and Alan’s families.

Dr. Carr, the doctor on Extenuating Circumstances, observes Kira through a two-way mirror. While he examines her using his robotic assistants, Kira pays attention, looking for clues to understand the xeno. She believes it is either a nanomachine or a gene-hacked life-form, and she can tell that it is sentient to some degree. The robots cannot pierce or damage the xeno, and, in fact, it grows thicker in response. Kira wonders why it does not spike out, as it did on Adra. Dr. Carr fires lasers at it, managing to create a hole briefly, but the fibers reweave themselves. Although it hurts Kira, Carr continues, using his robotic assistants to restrain her. Finally, she breaks a robot to escape, something that she should not have been able to do as an unenhanced human.