"Get away, Dr. Watson!" Rachel panicked as she saw Artemis bending over him—Dr. Watson, only sitting at the edge of the chair, looked to Rachel with baffled eyes. Artemis craned his neck to reveal newly applied bandages to Dr. Watson's ankle.
"Emma, what the hell happened to you?" Dr. Watson grunted before frowning at the lacerations on her arm.
"It's nothing, Doctor," Artemis lifted his head, answering for Rachel.
"Artemis, my son," Dr. Watson began to praise, "you truly are my greatest creation." He lifted his wrinkled hand and stroked the fine, yellow hairs on Artemis's head. The Android raised his gleaming eyes to Dr. Watson.
"Why are you here?" The doctor sneered beneath his brow. Freezing, Rachel stumbled on her words. What does he mean? Why, why would you ever say such a thing?
"I was just checking up on you, father," Rachel's deep hatred for Artemis boiled under her skin, "I never liked Artemis, anyways, and you always understood that, so when I tell you how dangerous he is to our mission—"
"I'll tell you you're just acting jealous." Dr. Watson interrupted. He slowly looked up to her with emotionless eyes.
Emma Rachel's lip quivered with anger and sadness—she stood there, on the verge of crying; Peter being too stubborn to acknowledge his faults, and Artemis being too simple minded to understand—or at least pretending to be apathetic.
—-
"Are you feeling any better, Taylor?"
Celene Anders carefully draped a wooly blanket over his tense shoulders and guided him to sit on the bed. Taylor practically busted down her door in attempt at getting her attention—and to Celene's surprise, when she opened her door, found him shivering on the cold metal floor.
He started stuttering out of shock—"I-I-it-it-s-s-something tr-tr-tr—tried to k-k-kill-k-kill me. It-t-t—w-w-was—it was-s-s. . ." It was Artemis.
Shhh. . .Celene tried to comfort him. . .take a deep breath and relax. . . "All will be alright. . ." She patted his cold body down, rubbed his shoulders—and gave him a cup of warm milk. He took a sip; his hands still twitching.
Very shakily, Taylor tried to speak again, "there is an alien aboard this ship." He turned and faced Celene who equally stared wide eyed back. At that moment, Taylor saw exactly what Celene was thinking plastered right on her face.
Taylor was the killer.
"No!" He suddenly yelled, "no, I know what you're thinking, and it's not me! Ok? I haven't killed anyone nor have I let any foreign—!" Celene quickly got up and scrambled out her door, leaning against the hallway wall for support. Taylor jumped from the bed and aggressively sprinted around the corner of the door frame and tackled Celene—he pushed her against the wall and hissed into her face.
"It's not me! Okay?"
Celene squirmed, tilting her head, "NO!" Taylor pushed her again.
"there is an unidentifiable organism on this ship! It's the killer!"
"Stop!" Taylor let go of her as she threatened to scream. Celene pushed him away and straightened her shirt.
Bewilderment etched across her pale face. "Well, we have to tell Dr. Watson about—"
"No!" Taylor hissed again, "if we tell Dr. Watson, he'll leave us for dead on another planet, or worse, kill us on site. I don't know about you, but I value my life." He pushed her against the wall again, tightly grabbing at the base of her neck. His head scanned the area once more before turning back, leaning in, whispering, "we have to figure out who it's going to kill next. Who else is on this god damn ship that it might go for?"
"Well. . ." Celene's voice wavered in fear, "there's. . .Smith a—and Peterson. . .Dr. Sydnee—"
"She's dead."
"What?" Celene shriveled a bit at the sound of the heart breaking news. "How?"
"It already got to her. . ." Taylor sighed and loosened his grip; Celene moved away. At first, the lights down the hall started to flash, but in an instant, so did the ones right before them and then the horrible noise started blaring. "It's the fire alarm!"
Together, Celene and Taylor raced down the hall to the cafeteria. Their breath was in their ears along with the incessant ringing of the alarm.
—-
When they finally ran through, the doors closed automatically. Loudly, Rachel shouted over the alarm exclaiming Dr. Sydnee was dead. Red lights flashed on and off until Celene ran to the end of the hall and turned off the noisy horn and flashing lights.
"Is everyone accounted for?" Rachel paced the room: everyone stood still in their place as she mentally took role. Her head did a double take before everyone realized there was something amiss:
David Peterson was missing. . .
A hiss from the doors sounded signifying an entrance. "Arty," Dr. Watson voiced, "have you seen Peterson?" He calmly asked. Artemis slowly shook his head no and began to inquire about the apparent emergency.
Rachel sighed, "alright, everyone stay here at all costs: I'm going to go find Peterson." Not a single soul objected, leaving the rest to silently stare at each other except for Dr. Watson who decided to eat.
—-
Two minutes before. . .
Everything had been quiet except for the distant hum of the generators while David Peterson laid down on his bed. He decided to play a little earthly ambience of birds and rushing water—the comfort of home just at the tips of his fingers, but as he reached over, he dropped his circular speaker and watched it roll across his bedroom floor right before a pair of inorganic feet.
It was Artemis.
Bending down, quite stiffly and precise, Artemis grabbed the round speaker and turned it off with an audible click of the switch. The android never smiled nor did he even blink at Peterson who so casually said hello. Instead, he offered to whip up a drink—Artemis held up a black cocktail shaker that had bumps and minor divots and poured out thick black liquid, the consistency of molasses, into a little shot glass, mixed vodka in it, and handed it to Peterson.
"Peterson, do you know exactly why you are here?" Artemis questioned
"Yeah, just some minor terraforming project—ah, what is this?" He held up the glass; the thick mucus like syrup trickled down his lip.
"You'll see soon enough," Artemis innocently chuckled. And he was right—Peterson coughed once, clearing his throat, then again more harshly. He kept coughing and coughing until blood seeped out of his mouth. Laying back, he choked on his blood. . .Artemis holding him down. . .his stomach shivered as he frothed at the mouth. . .
Just as Peterson's body finally loosened and fell still, Artemis patiently waited for his sons birth: crawling out of the gaping mouth, a white, pale (yet quite small) spider clawed its way to the surface of the skin. For a second, it waved its short, arm like pedipalps as in hello, then, the spider sunk its fangs into the soft skin. It throbbed as it sucked the blood right out of the veins and arteries, giving life to the spider as the abdomen and thorax turned bright red. After a few seconds more, the hairy legs soon turned bright red; the short stiff hairs stood straight up, and as Artemis leaned forward, he ran his finger just above the small cluster of eight eyes, down the thorax and then abdomen, carefully caressing the two spinnerets protruding beneath the top of the abdomen.
Digestive fluids oozed into the holes punctured by the fangs, and the epithelial tissue dissolved into a digestible liquid. The galactic spider slurped Peterson up.
"My child," Artemis reached out his hand to let the red spider crawl on, "growing boys need their food for strength." He reached below the counter and pulled out a tray full of shivering yellow dots—baby spiders—and placed his son with his sisters. Slowly, but ever so surely, the red spider ate away at the clustering yellow swarm, grabbing them with its pedipalps and stuffing it into its fangs. . .
—-
There, on the bed, Peterson laid serenely still as death himself; Rachel scrunched her noise from the smell. She hurried to the bed, pulling the covers down—
"augh—" she gaged. Peterson's body had been carved out with jagged cuts and bruises circling the deep pool of blended organs. Rachel moved to stare at his face; his eyes closed and mouth softly shut—it was too early for rigor mortis. There! Just then, the liquids pooled in the gaping stomach rippled; a little white tail peaked through. A human finger instinctively reached out to touch it, but before Rachel could comprehend what she saw, a bloodied spider like creature leaped out of Peterson's stomach and straight to her face—Rachel's features were pulverized on impact. . .