"AI… Occam, this is Asselis Mika reporting a malfunction in Cold-sleep Room One." After no response from the intercom set into the control wall, she rushed out into the corridor and tried the intercom there.
"There is no malfunction in Cold-sleep Room One," one of the AI's subminds informed her.
"The Outlinker woman who we recently placed in a coffin there is dead," Mika replied, trying to keep her voice from getting shrill.
"System function return is optimal. There is no problem in Cold-sleep Room One," repeated the sub-mind in a somewhat annoyed tone. Clearly, even though only a submind, it did not like having to point out the obvious to idiots.
"I suggest you send a drone here as fast as you damned well can, because I don't think that rigor mortis and postmortem lividity are particularly healthy symptoms even for someone in cold-sleep! Also, I'm standing out in the corridor at the moment since the com in there does not work either."
"System function return for com is optimal. There is no problem with the com in Cold-sleep Room One. Asselis Mika, do you require medical assistance?"
"I want a direct link with Tomalon or Occam itself," she demanded.
"You have a problem," immediately stated the voice of Tomalon. "Occam is gearing for a full diagnostic check and I have sent Aiden and Cento to assist you."
"Good," said Mika. "I must go back in now to check the other coffins."
"If you do," said the Captain, "do not use your console, as it may be infected."
"You suspect a computer virus," Mika stated.
"Virus or worm, whatever. There are too many safety backups in the cold-sleep control system for it to be anything other than deliberate subversion of programs."
"Murder," muttered Mika, heading back into the room and instantly thinking, like so many of those who have sought to do the best for a patient and failed: How do I tell her son? And there was no one who could answer that question for her, dared she even to ask it.
Every com-unit howled, whether it was mounted on a wall, integrated in a wristcom, or part of the device built inside a Golem's head. Cormac exited his room and broke into a run. Halfway down the corridor he felt something lurch through his body as he passed over a fluxing grav-plate. He immediately halted and stepped over to a nearby handle affixed to the wall and gripped it for support.
"Tomalon? Occam?"
From his wristcom issued a sound that could have been interference but sounded more like a steady keening.
"Aiden? Cento?"
"Online," came the twinned reply.
"What's happening?" he asked.
"All the people in Cold-sleep Room One are dead," replied Aiden flatly.
"Oh God, no…" Tomalon intruded, his voice fading into then out of audibility. Nothing useful there.
"Aiden, get yourself and Mika back up to Medical. I advise you to use the shaft ladders, as the drop-shafts may not be functioning correctly. Do we know who else hasn't gone into cold-sleep yet?"
"There is no one else," replied the Golem.
"Okay." Cormac paused, not wanting to examine too closely what that might mean. "Is Gant still in the Security Area?" he finished.
"He is."
"And still no response from there?"
"None."
"Right, that seems one likely source of our problem. Cento, I want you to join me there."
"Will do," replied Cento. Then, "There is another probable source."
"Yes," replied Cormac, thinking about the millions of tonnes of alien attached to the outside of the ship. "But would Dragon attack like this from such a vulnerable position? It knows that the Occam could turn it to space-borne ash in a few seconds, and anyway every system on that side of the ship is isolated." He believed this was nothing to do with the alien — so it was something else.
"Tomalon?" Cormac asked again.
Again that keening sound, then eventually Tomalon spoke. "They're all dead," he said dully.
"We know that," spat Cormac. "Let's now find out why and prevent any more deaths."
"They are all dead," Tomalon groaned.
"What precisely do you mean?" asked Cormac, suddenly all cold function.
"All of them! All of them!" The voice was Tomalon's and it was also Occam's.
"Do you mean everyone who went into cold-sleep?" It was a question Cormac did not want to ask, but had to.
"Yes," the reply, echoed from intercoms all down the corridor. Almost unconsciously, Cormac reached back with his finger and initiated his shuriken holster. Underneath his sudden frigidity of thought, he felt a ball of anger growing.
"Listen to me carefully, Tomalon. I can understand your and Occam's grief, and feelings of guilt, but you are merely feeding each other's dysfunction. I need you to stabilize ship control and go to maximum internal security alert."
"Initiate Golem?" returned the voice of Tomalon, echoed a fraction of a second later by the voice of Occam.
"No. With this level of subversion we cannot guarantee that they won't be under someone else's control. They are just as much in storage as the people in cold-sleep. Get your drones searching the ship, especially in and around the Security Area. I'll be there soon."
"I… will," the Captain managed.
Now Cormac altered settings on his wristcom and opened a channel that had been isolated for this single purpose.
"Dragon?"
For a long moment there was no reply, then a grudging, "Yes."
"Are you attacking us?" he asked.
There came a roaring, as from a vast crowd-filled auditorium in response to some momentous event. "I am legion," Dragon replied, as this sound slowly died.
"If you do not give direct answers to direct questions, I will send the code to detonate the CTD that presently sits between you and this ship. Perhaps you would survive the blast, but I think it unlikely you would survive being shoved out of the underspace field and being smeared across a few light years."
"I am not attacking. I cannot attack," Dragon immediately replied.
Cormac considered that: how easily it could be a lie. With his finger poised over his wristcom he still considered sending the code that would detonate the CTD, as even if Dragon was not the source of the present danger it would be best to detonate to curtail future dangers. The creature's next words stopped him, however.
"I can see it," said Dragon.
"What can you see?"
"I can see the enemy. It is on your ship and it will take your ship. It is what it does and it is what it is."
"This enemy, what is it?"
"Ancient," said Dragon. "The eater. The body that continues to kill and consume after its mind is burnt. You must return to realspace. I must leave this ship."
"You know your words are opaque to me," said Cormac. "Get pellucid or you'll be leaving this ship in pieces."