Launch Day

Dirk will continue stepping back, slowly retreating from its expansion.

"I don’t know, it’s still coming in…."

The distorted anomaly moves forward (or the closest equivalent your mind can process on how it actually moves) but then seems to halt at Weintraub's corpse. The distortion seems to enter into Weintraub's body, sinking down into the flesh. After several moments Weintraub's body begins to bubble and dissolve, the flesh sloughing off his face and some out of the suit's openings.

---

O'Neil finishes his chanting. He's sweating and breathing heavily. "It's done," he pants. The satellite has gone completely dark, and only now you notice there had been a faint humming sensation you could feel through your suit that has ceased. "We should get back to the shuttle. What do you want to do about..." he turns and looks at Hamlet's lifeless suit.

"Bring him back. Give him a proper burial. Seems like the right thing to do," Belton replies. He sounds detached, resigned... he wasn't sure why O'Neil had ended up killing Hamlet when he had already made peace with the sacrifice, but nothing Belton could do or say could change that now.

When O'Neil was ready, Belton starts leading them back to the shuttle with Hamlet in tow.

"Did it just ... did that thing ... oh my God. What is it?"

Her eyes then turn to O'Neil and his question. All she can muster is a slow I don't know, headshake.

Seeing the flesh melt off Weintraub, Dirk jumps back far from the body.

"Whoa! What the fuck!?"

Dirk looks frantically around the room for something to defend himself with.

"Let’s get back to the bridge and seal the room!"

Thinking he hears Dirk's exclamation, Spay calls back to Dirk and Dierdre, "Report, what's going on?"

Responding to Spay in exasperation as he rushes out:

"That thing…! That distortion thing! It melted Weintraub’s body! I think we got a biological attack or something here! We need to contain it!"

"Can someone get me a sample to analyze so we know what we are dealing with?" Being able to focus on something was helping the doctor hold on to some amount of her waning sanity.

Belton and O'Neil arrive back in the shuttle with Hamlet's corpse in tow. Entering the air lock, O'Neil says they are ready to enter but why isn't anybody at the airlock waiting for them?

"What the hell is going on?" Belton mutters, more to himself than anything. "Any of you gents want to come open up the airlock? There's no doorbell out here y'know."

Spay distracted by the anomaly and Dirk and Deirdre’s investigation hears Belton’s communication and snaps to a response, "Sorry, roger, coming to open the airlock."

He makes sure the shuttle controls are locked and heads to let them in.

Thankfully the anomaly has yet to reappear, but that makes you equally nervous as you have no idea of its location. Opening the airlock, Belton and O'Neil float into the cargo bay. You are surprised to see them towing Hamlet who is floating horizontally and not moving.

Seeing Hamlet horizontal is a surprise to Spay. Not exactly sure what they accomplished out there besides taking Hamlet’s life he asks,"What the hell happened? Mission accomplished?" He asks the last part with an eye on O’Neil.

Dierdre follows Spay to the airlock. The site of Hamlet threatens to unhinge her yet again.

"The sacrifice has been made," she announces to no one in particular.

O'Neil nods. "Yes, the satellite has been deactivated for good. You've done the whole world a service and made it safer for all of us. More than you will hopefully ever know. Now, we need to--what the hell is that?" O'Neil looks aghast as he catches sight of the human soup that is all that is left of Weintraub.

Dirk glares at O’Neill and has the urge to punch him after seeing Hamlet, but his mind shifts back to the anomaly when Weintraub is brought up again.

"Something appeared in the ship and started melting his body or something. We don’t know where that something went to but it’s a real fucked update situation. If we’re done here, I say it’s time to head home."

"Say that again? What do you mean 'something'?" As if on queue, the fractal distortion of space time rises out of the floor of the ship. Whatever it touches seems to distort as well. The floor under the anomaly is no longer smooth metal but has a fractal geometrical pattern as if its atoms had been rearranged. O'Neil inhales sharply. "It's a Derivative! Oh my god, Weintraub, we were right!" O'Neil then shakes himself. "We have to get out of here, now! Don't let it touch you!"

"The more you talk, the more I wish you were wrong," Belton says to O'Neil, stepping back away from the... derivative, was it? "How do we get it off the ship? I don't want to take it home, or have it... "complicate..." re-entry."

Keeping away from the anomaly O’Neil called a derivative Spay calls out as he heads to the cockpit, "Aright, let’s get moving! Positions everyone."

He plans to get the shuttle on its way. Hoping the fractal distortion stays behind.