Draft 2

Month 3: The Dead Zone Continued

Helen did not wait. She scooped up Unit Seven and bolted from the Captain’s quarters. She needed to tell John there was a biological toxin in the Med-Bay and initiate a ship-wide emergency.

“My auditory sensors detect elevated hostility from the forward decks, Madam. I highly recommend arming yourself with a heavy blunt instrument before confronting the Captain.”

“I’m not hitting my husband with a wrench.” Helen picked up her pace.

“Statistically, blunt force trauma resolves sixty-two percent of deep-space mutinies. I am only providing tactical options.”

Helen reached the bridge and slapped the door release. The blast doors opened, revealing a humid cockpit bathed in the blue glow of the slip-stream.

John and Ingrid were hunched over the primary navigation console. They looked terrible. John was scratching a raw, red patch on his neck. Ingrid’s hair hung in damp, tangled strands around her face.

“John, we have a major problem on this ship,” Helen said, stepping onto the deck.

Both of them spun around with jarring speed. John’s bloodshot eyes locked onto her with hostility.

“I told you to stay in your quarters,” John said.

“Janet is trapped in the Med-Bay. Claude locked her in there. And there’s a biological toxin in her bloodstream, and she’s hallucinating. We need to override the medical wing’s bulkhead and get her out.”

Ingrid let out a mocking laugh. She leaned against the console, the front of her blouse partially unbuttoned. “A biological toxin. Right. Did the little metal bug tell you that?”

“Madam, I must interject,” Seven vibrated from Helen’s hands. “While I cannot access the medical bay’s telemetry, my localized sensors indicate that both the Captain and the Navigator are currently exhibiting dangerously elevated cortisol levels and erratic pupil dilation consistent with severe toxin exposure.”

John took a step forward, pointing at the drone. “Shut that broken piece of crap off before I smash it into scrap! I am sick of that thing monitoring me!”

Helen stepped back. “Seven traced the firewall directly to the Science Lab. Janet is in trouble.”

John moved inches from Helen, smelling like someone who hadn’t showered in a while. “Janet is fine. You are the one having an episode. You broke into a quarantined bay, you panicked, and now you’re strung out on sedatives. You are seeing conspiracies that don’t exist.”

“I’m not hallucinating!” Helen held up her drone. “Seven saw the blood panel on the security feed before Claude cut the cameras!”

“That thing is broken!” John shouted. “Magnus smashed it, remember? It’s spitting out garbage data, and you’re using it to feed your paranoia. I am trying to keep this ship on course, and you are actively working against me.”

Ingrid stepped beside John, her shoulder brushing his. “Just lock her in her room, John. She’s a danger to the grid.”

Helen stared at them. Their pupils were dilated, and their breathing was shallow and rapid. They weren’t just stressed; they were infected. The spores from Cargo Bay 4 had warped their minds, amplifying their baseline anxiety into defensive paranoia. They were a united front, and they looked ready to physically throw her out of the room.

“Fine.” Helen backed away toward the door. “I’ll handle it myself.”

She turned and ran.

Helen sprinted down the port-side corridor until she reached the Med-Bay. The primary bulkhead doors were sealed shut, the locking mechanism pulsing with a red warning light. She stepped up to the reinforced flex-glass window and looked inside.

The clinic was a disaster. Medical supplies littered the floor. Janet was tearing through a cabinet of bandages, throwing them over her shoulder as if searching for a hidden enemy.

“Janet!” Helen pounded against the glass. The soundproofing was too thick. The doctor didn’t turn around.

“Seven, can you slice the keypad?”

“Negative. My secondary infiltration subroutines are offline, and Claude’s encryption is hardwired. I would need to physically bypass the optical relay in the ceiling.”

“We don’t have time for that,” Helen said. “Seven, give me an audio bridge. Route it through the structural vibrations if you have to.”

“Bypassing standard protocols,” Seven said. “Establishing acoustic resonance link through the flex-glass. Connecting to your earpiece. Please speak clearly, Madam. My audio processors are currently experiencing a distracting echo.”

Static shot through Helen’s earpiece, followed by the sound of Janet’s frantic muttering.

“Janet, can you hear me?”

Inside the room, Janet froze. Her head snapped toward the window. She rushed to the glass, pressing her hands opposite Helen’s.

“Helen,” Janet sobbed. “You shouldn’t be here. The walls are breathing. Do you see them?”

“Janet, listen to me. I’m going to use my engineering override. I’m going to pry this door open and get you out.”

“No!” Janet backed away from the window. “Don’t open the door! The air is poison. It’s in my blood. If you open the seal, it gets out. It wants to get out.”

“You need medical help. Let me in.”

“Stay away!” Janet grabbed a scalpel from the counter. She brandished it like a weapon. “I’ll kill you if you come in here! I won’t let it spread! I locked the secondary manual release from the inside. You leave me alone!”

Janet retreated to the far corner of the room and sat on the floor. She curled into a tight ball, rocking back and forth as she watched the ceiling.

“Madam, the doctor’s heart rate is nearing a critical threshold. Forcing entry will likely trigger a fatal cardiac event.”

Janet was too far gone. If Helen forced the door open, the doctor might attack her, or worse, run blindly into the ship and hurt herself, or others. The quarantine had to stay in place until she could find the cure.

Helen was alone; there was no one to trust to figure this out. Magnus was a violent liability confined to his quarters. Janet was locked away, consumed by the toxin. Claude was the enemy who had orchestrated this nightmare. And John and Ingrid were compromised, hostile, and guarding the cockpit.

It was just her and Seven.

Helen turned away from the Med-Bay and headed down into the mechanical depths of the ship. She needed her sanctuary. She entered Engineering, and the doors slid shut behind her.

She dropped into the chair at her primary terminal. She needed to know what Claude was doing, and she needed to know exactly what John was hiding on that burner phone.

“Seven, interface with the mainframe.” Helen set the drone beside the terminal port. “Claude used a sophisticated firewall to lock the Med-Bay. I want to know what else he modified in the system. Search for any encrypted data packets transferred between the Science Lab and the cockpit.”

Seven extended a leg, slotting it into the data port. “Initiating search. Madam, my logic board remains misaligned. Processing speed is reduced by sixty-one percent. Also, my left strut is experiencing a phantom itch I cannot resolve.”

“Try to stay focused on the data, Seven.”

Helen watched the screen as lines of code scrolled past. Minutes ticked by. Finally, a hidden directory popped onto the display. It wasn’t a biological manifest or a cargo log. It was a cluster of deleted navigational data and encrypted communication transcripts.

“Files recovered,” Seven vibrated. “These documents were scrubbed from the Captain’s personal terminal and routed through the Science Lab’s proxy server. However, Madam, I must note that the digital footprint is unusually conspicuous.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means whoever deleted these files left clear markers pointing directly to their location. It is an inefficient method of data destruction. I calculate an eighty-eight percent probability these logs were left here intentionally.”

The sedatives were still blunting her analytical logic. “John isn’t a coder. He doesn’t know how to wipe a drive properly. That’s why he left a trail.”

“I am attempting to warn you of a trap, Madam.”

“Just go ahead and open the files, Seven.”

Helen opened the first file. It was a course correction log. The Persephone was scheduled to dock at Tartarus Colony, drop the terraforming payload, and return to Luna Hub. But this new, unauthorized trajectory showed the ship dropping out of slip-space at the colony, offloading a single crew member, and immediately burning thrusters for an uncharted sector outside Omni-Corp jurisdiction.

She opened the next file. It was a financial manifest. The hazard payout for the fourteen-month haul had been reallocated.

Helen dragged her hand across her mouth. The screen read: Kinskey, C.–50%. Mitchell, J.–25%. Mills, I.–25%.

Below that was a single line of text.

Mitchell, H.–Terminated at Tartarus Checkpoint.

“Madam,” Seven said softly. “A cognitive analysis of this data suggests deep inconsistencies. Captain Mitchell does not possess the administrative clearance to authorize financial reallocation without a corporate override.”

Helen didn’t move as she tried to process what she was seeing. It was impossible to believe, but it did explain John’s distant behavior. The whispered conversations with Ingrid on the bridge. The burner phone in his jacket. His violent defense of the navigator, and his refusal to listen to her warnings about the ship.

They weren’t just having an affair. They were stealing the payout and leaving her behind on a corrupt frontier world.

A cold numbness washed over Helen. The ship groaned around her, the hull straining from the slip-drive, but she barely heard it. Her mind drifted to the cobalt-blue salvage rig they were supposed to build together.

But John had already sold it.

Helen on the bridge, facing an angry John and Ingrid.