Status Report

“And what are you gonna do about it? I don’t—”

That was all Petrikov could say before my fist connected with his jaw, knocking him off balance as he stumbled towards the ground. 

“YOU don’t get to decide things anymore. You’re the reason we’re in this mess.” I spat, my anger growing by the second.

Our mission was simple: Stay on the Maintenance Space Station as it drifted through its predetermined route, be on standby while the Station autonomously performed the repairs needed on the Ganymede Resupply Post, then get our happy asses back home to collect the check. Easy money, they said.

My hand ached, I guess I hit Petrikov harder than I intended. As I flexed my fingers— and with that motion I was brought back to the start of the mission, before things had gotten so bad.

[Mission Start]

I had just sealed my gloves, the last step needed before Central Command would tell you which transportation pod to board. 

“So you got that Ellis?” Chief Adams asked.

“Yeah, sounds normal enough.” I responded, not having listened to a word he said. 

I had been doing this for so long that I just knew how to do the work without thinking about it anymore, it was all routine.

Standing in the transportation pod, I moved my eyes around to see how many crew members I’d have this time. You know it’s funny, it doesn’t matter if you are in a team of three or a team of twelve, they always positioned our restrainer seats facing at least one other member. This would be nice if you could actually move and talk, but since you’re restrained the only real options you have are either glancing around and making awkward eye contact with the person in front of you or you could close your eyes and go to sleep. I chose the latter.

Once we were docked onto the MSS and released the transportation pod the job was pretty much over; I had worked on enough of these maintenance missions to know we literally just sit here and wait until the Station begins its autonav to our destination. Aside from something going wrong we really didn’t have much to do. 

The three of us stood there— no one introduced themselves, just stood there looking around the room.

“Does anyone else see that?” The taller one of the men facing me asked, pointing to a loose panel on the bulkhead. Now that I saw it myself it did seem out of place in the otherwise flawless assembly of the station’s walls. 

Without a word the shorter, stockier of the two walked over and fixed the panel.

“I will be in my cot. If there is an emergency, talk to me but otherwise leave me alone.” He said, flatly.

I’d like to say that after that there was an emergency, but the reality is nothing happened for a long time. I had come to learn that the taller of the two men is named Weston, and for all that he told me he seems to be a decent guy. Has a family back at home, a wife and some older kids. Took the job so that he could afford to retire himself and his wife, considering he will be about retirement age by the time we come back. I’ll most likely be in my fifties. I don’t know about the fat man as he hasn’t left his cot since that first day, to be honest we only know he’s still alive because he snores really loudly whenever he sleeps.

I was sitting at the table listening to Weston complain about the recluse when an echoing BEEP came through the station’s conference room.

“Shit.” I said. Hearing a beep is not good, as a beep means Command sent us a message. If Command had bothered to send us a message that means that something really bad must have happened, given how long it would take for any kind of back and forth communication to happen.

Without a word, Weston and I made our way towards the conference room.

When we got there however I saw the antisocial man standing in the center of the room, a greenish white egg in his hands.

“Alright, which one of you two put this here?” He asked, staring at us.

“Dunno, that’s not mine.” I said with a shrug.

“I didn’t put that there either.” Weston replied avoiding eye contact with the man in front of him.

A thick silence hung in the air as we stood there, looking at one another. After a moment the man sat the egg on the table, which promptly rolled off said table and cracked onto the floor next to us, seeping out a green goo.

“Looks like it’s not an issue anymore.” I said.

“Ha ha” The man said sarcastically before continuing, “I’ll still send a status report to Central Command so they’re aware of it, but I guess it was nothing so sorry for the bother.”

“It’s fine. What’s your name anyways?” Weston asked, but I could sense he wanted this conversation to end sooner rather than later.

“Petrikov.” The man said before walking away towards his hermitage.

I thought nothing of it honestly, probably just leftover cargo from another expedition. As I was turning back towards my own solitude Weston asked:

“Should we clean this or…?”

“Nah, fuck it.” I said. We didn’t bring it on board so it’s not really our problem honestly, I’m sure it’ll be fine.

After that life aboard the MSS resumed its monotony for a while, the egg was cleaned up at some point and things went back to normal. It’s strange to be in that kind of routine as you find yourself seeking the comfort of doing mundane things, even when the most exciting part of said routine was whenever the panel fell off on the bulkhead or we had to send out our biweekly status report back to Central to let them know we were still alive and doing our jobs. Sometimes though Command would ask us if we had any messages for our families which was nice of them to do. It was while I was filling out one of these forms that I first heard Weston scream.

I got to the conference room as soon and stood there as I processed the scene before me. Weston was standing in front of a green… thing. It’s hard to explain how it looked but it was like someone made a troll sized play doh sculpture of a human, indents placed where facial features and other openings would have been. Its hands didn’t really end in fingers but short stocky stumps, perfectly rounded at its tip.

“What the fuck…” I said, staring in awe and not really knowing what I was looking at. While I could tell that the thing in front of us was alive, it wasn’t attacking us. Not yet anyways.

Petrikov pushed past me into the room, stopping mid step when he realized what we were dealing with.

“You two” He barked looking at Weston and I “Out of the room, now. Grab something we can use as a weapon.”

A weapon what…? I guess it’s better to be safe than sorry but was it really smart to make this thing feel threatened? Would we even be able to do anything if it chose to attack?

“Petrikov relax man, let’s just quarantine the room with sealant foam and contact command.” I said, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Don’t tell me what to do and don’t fucking touch me.” He said before shrugging off my hand. “The fact that this alien is standing in front of us means whatever space craft is used was undetected by our station. Contacting Command would just take too long and I have a bad feeling about this thing, looking at it makes me feel like I’m growing a tumor inside my fucking head.”

“And what if it didn’t use a space craft to get here?” I asked. He was right though, this thing did have a subtle sense of wrongness attached to it.

“Then God help us all.”

While we waited for Weston’s return with what would hopefully be a solution to our situation, the creature just stood there, not really doing anything. Looking at it was strange, I felt weirdly… attached to it? I knew that that didn’t make sense, this weird alien obviously was not supposed to be here but at the same time… It was almost like whenever I would look at it I would see a younger version of myself who I was, that little kid who used to chase squirrels at the park and loved dinosaurs. I found myself looking at its face the most. Its indents were just so weird I couldn’t really look away from them… its angles and shadows almost hypnotizing me.

Wait… did it just grow an eye?

I couldn’t really tell if that was what they were… in the indents where eyes would be on a person’s face there were two small holes, to be honest I couldn’t really tell if they were actual holes or just black pupils staring back at me.

“I found these guys.” Weston said, carrying what appeared to be a bottle of sealant foam and a dinging hammer. “I didn’t really know which way we wanted to go with this so…” He trailed off, looking at the ground.

Petrikov took the dinging hammer from Weston, and before we could say anything he lunged at the creature and hit it with the hammer firmly on the side of its head. One hit was all he could get in however, because the hammer got stuck to its skin the moment it made contact. Whatever this thing was, it wasn’t friendly anymore after that.

It was hard to describe the sound it made. I couldn’t really hear it but I felt it making its way to the inside of my brain like a parasite, gnawing away at my head and I just knew shit had hit the fan then. That’s when I noticed Petrikov beside me. His ears were bleeding.

“Petrikov GET BACK.” I shouted, before I snatched the bottle from Weston and just started spraying the thing head to toe in the foam. I wasn’t sure if it would do anything but this is all we had.

Stepping back I continued to spray the foam, coagulating it all into a huge pile with the creature stuck in the middle. I prayed then, hoping that if there was a god out there it would be kind enough to grant us a quick death if this thing got out.

“We’re getting better weapons and we’re going back in there.” Petrikov barked, his words cutting through the silence.

“Absolutely not.” I retorted. 

“I don’t want to either, we need to blockade this section completely and make foam wa-”

“Fine. I will come back with better weapons and kill it.” Petrikov cut him off.

“What the fuck is your problem?” I snapped at him, my growing dislike of him hardening into hatred. “It’s like you’re hellbent on getting us killed. We are NOT going to try engaging with this thing any further, we have to contain it completely before it does anything else and I won’t let you jeopardize it.” 

“And what are you gonna do about it? I don’t—”

That was all Petrikov could say before my fist connected with his jaw, knocking him off balance as he stumbled towards the ground. 

“YOU don’t get to decide things anymore. You’re the reason we’re in this mess” I spat, my anger growing by the second.

Our mission was simple: Stay on the Maintenance Space Station as it drifted through its predetermined route, be on standby while the Station autonomously performed the repairs needed on the Ganymede Resupply Post, then get our happy asses back home to collect the check. Easy money, they said.

My hand ached, I guess I hit Petrikov harder than I intended. As I flexed my fingers— and with that motion I was brought back to the start of the mission, before things had gotten so bad.

But that was then, and I had to prioritize my survival now.

“You motherfucker.” Petrikov said as he stood up and started closing the space between us, but Weston blocked his path at the last moment. Petrikov tried to push past him but Weston was stronger.

“Fuck you both.” He said defeated. “I’m telling you, if we don’t kill that thing now we are going to die.”

“You tried to hammer it and it just made things worse.” I said, checking my ears. Yup, I was bleeding too.

“Maybe we can burn it if blunt force won’t do it?” Weston suggested, Petrikov staring at him like he was stupid all the while.

“No we can’t make a controlled fire in here, the sprinklers would kick in before it got big enough to burn it.” I said, shutting that idea down. “We could try acid.” I said, desperately reaching for a solution.

“And where would we get that genius?” Petrikov said sarcastically. “Unless you can synthesize your own from the cleaning supplies we don’t have anything corrosive enough to melt that thing. And even then what would you do just throw it on it? Jesus, I'm surrounded by idiots.” He said, putting his palm to his face.

“Fuck you.” I said. 

“Fuck yo-” 

“ENOUGH.” Weston shouted, frustrated. “I am not going to die because you two assholes can get along. “Ellis cut it with the slick shit and help me think here.” He added, staring at me.

We stood there in a suffocating silence. We were mere feet away from an alien while being stuck on a space station that won’t reach its destination for years, with no real way to get external help. 

“You know…” Petrikov started, a weird tone to his voice. “We could do a manual override of the station and careen it into a nearby asteroid. It’d kill us but the thing would die too.”

“What? No! I want to make it home to my family man. This job wasn’t supposed to be dangerous.” Weston protested, obviously starting to panic.

“You think I want to die? Would you rather that shit follow us to Ganymede, kill everyone at the post?” Petrikov said, getting in Weston’s face. “Or maybe have it come home to Earth and just kill people there instead?” He continued, trying to get a reaction out of Weston.

While they were arguing I was thinking about ideas… there was something we could do, which only might have been our only option at this point.

“What if instead of overriding the navigation we did that to the sprinklers? That way we could burn this thing; fire extinguishers on standby in case the fire starts to spread or get too out of control.” I said, cutting them both off. Petrikov chuckled.

“Looks like you don’t have shit for brains after all.” He said, something not too dissimilar from respect creeping into his voice.

That was our plan and we followed it. I stood on the opposite side of the door frame as Weston as we watched Petrikov walk into the room, one of his smuggled bottles of alcohol in one hand and a wet rag in the other.

By this point most of the foam had dissolved, it seemed that whatever this creature was it was acidic to some capacity. Even as I recount it now I can hear the constant sizzling that surrounded us, a ticking time bomb mere feet away just waiting to explode.

After a few moments passed we saw the top of its head poke out from a freshly burnt section of the foam mound, and we knew then that that was our opening.

Petrikov took a few steps forward and launched the bottle at it.

Crack. 

That was the last sound I heard before the explosion.

I stood up from the ground, and stood in terror at what I saw. The wires around us were now on fire, with debris flown everywhere. I could see Petrikov lying limply on the ground, it looked like he was blown back into the wall. He wasn’t breathing anymore.

 As I looked into the conference room I could see that the foam ate most of the blast so thankfully our hull wasn’t compromised, but as I looked past the flames and the surrounding structural damage I saw Weston.

He was talking to the thing.

“Weston, get away from it!” I shouted, but he didn’t react.

I started walking towards him but he turned around and yelled:

“GET AWAY FROM PETRIKOV!”

Weston rushed me and started beating on me like an ape. I was shocked and slow to react so he nailed me in the face hard.

“ELLIS COME HERE AND HELP ME KILL IT.”

Ellis? I’m the one that he’s attacking. What the hell does he mean Ellis?

Oh fuck.

I looked at the thing behind Weston, and while it was hard to make out its features it looked like… me. 

“Weston, that's not me!” I tried to shout while defending myself from his attacks, but it was no use. It was like he wasn’t able to hear me. I knew then what I had to do.

I started to fight back. I curled my hands into fists and just started hitting him. First I focused on his body but no matter how hard I hit him he wouldn’t stop so I started hitting him in his face. It wasn’t until I got lucky and one of my punches connected with his jaw that he went down.

Exhausted, I stood there looking over Weston’s body.

“I’m sorry, friend.”

I turned my focus to the alien. The source of all of our pain and suffering stood there in front of me, and I was unarmed. This thing could fuck with people’s heads, so what chance did I stand? But at the same time that is precisely why I had to make sure this thing didn’t make it out, it can’t escape the MSS no matter what. 

And then I looked at it. If I wasn’t sure before I could now say with certainty that it did in fact have eyes. They were big, too big for its head and too human like for an alien. And even though I knew this I still hesitated.

I… didn’t want to hurt it. After all of this I stood here looking at it. I couldn’t understand why, but while I was aware that this thing was a treat my body just wouldn’t move toward it. Would it really be so bad if it lived? Maybe it was just scared.

I snapped myself out of it. What was I thinking? 

If I couldn’t fight it I had to run. I turned around and started running, the thing seemingly reacting by releasing that horrible sound again. I nearly fell off balance as I ran through the station’s different sections, but thankfully whatever this thing was it could not move fast.

I slammed open the doors of the control room of the station and barricaded them immediately. Not sparing a second I immediately began overriding the station’s navigation systems, resetting us to a nearby asteroid. Then I disabled the landing procedures.

And so that brings us to now. Last I checked the ETA was approximately eight Earth minutes, won’t be long now.

Command I hope that this recounting of events reaches you, and if it does please tell my family I love them. Tell my wife I’m sorry and that I love her. Tell my little boy I love him more than he could know.

It’s getting closer now. I hear it sizzling through the door; soon it will breach that and corrode my barricade. I see them too, Petrikov and Weston. They’re smiling at me and telling me to take down the barricade, let the alien in. “He’s just a friend”, they’ll say like I don’t know any better. It’s like this thing thinks I’m stupid or something. Well no matter, my time is coming soon and I’ll be damned if I let that bastard get to me. He’ll have to fight for it.

I sent the message, now all I had to do was wait.

The sizzling was louder now, quickly followed by the sound of my barricade corroding and falling apart. Looking at it I pointed my index finger to the visor above me, displaying an ever growing asteroid inching closer by the second. I knew it understood when it looked back at me once more.

I saw fear in its eyes.