A Scanner Deeply Ch. 07

"Whoa! Big EMP wave! The shields of the Recon melted! The probe almost didn't make it out on time! What an insane light show just went on in there! I'll replay the loop, but I think something just combusted in there. One of the organic signatures is gone. Let's hope Nathaniel is the one left."

"Come in, Commander. Come in." crackled a voice from the recon coms.

"Yes, this is Calixte. Who is this."

"This is Nathaniel. I am boarding the Recon to bring it back. My signature changed slightly. Please do not shoot on sight."

"Roger, Nathaniel. We will need positive identification though, after what we saw ourselves."

"No problem, Commander. If my clone accepts me and I don't shine like a Quafe bottle in a microwave, I think that should be proof enough."

***

Docking request accepted. Your ship will be towed into station.

He slipped into an emergency suit, with an integral helmet, inside the recon, after slipping out of the pod. No sense in frightening anyone on board more than they already had.

The ship door slid open and he marched to the docking console.

"Not an entirely unsuccessful operation." His voice crackled over the coms, and he dumped a handful of data plates onto the metal surface. "Something I found in the main generator room." He shuffled with an uneasy heavy gait towards the clone vat bays. "I would bookmark that shuttle if I were you, Commander. And add a sign for extreme biohazard on it..."

A medical attendant rushed to Nathaniel with a full reanimation kit in tow. "Sir, I don't know how you are doing it but your vitals are unread-." He was violently shoved to the side by Nathaniel.

"Let me be." His voice crackled on coms, as he hadn't taken off his helmet inside station.

He reached the clone vats and got to his, deactivated the cryo, opened the glass cover.

The medical attendant ran back to Calixte. "Commander, a clone should not be opened until the infomorph data has been sent in. All reports say this person is dead, dead, dead!"

Nathaniel removed a glove to reveal a brownish-green hand.

A small flash of green passed between the suit and the clone.

The suit fell in on itself with the sound of some giant animal vomiting.

"What IS this stuff." Asked the medical attendant, as he prodded the suit's clasp with his shoe.

Nathaniel, stark naked, rose from the open vat.

"Oh. No. Don't do that. I had to 'host' myself in one of the dead guys that were in the sarcophagi in that shuttle."

As the helmet unclicked from the suit, a river of gore and bones slithered out and pooled at the feet of the fainting medical assistant.