In situations like this, where screams rang out through creepy corridors of mold-laden space stations, the smart thing to do was to run. Run as far and as fast as you could in the opposite direction. Anyone with an ounce of self-preservation would instinctively know that.

So why, Fade wondered, was he running towards it?

He must be going mad.

The sound of his feet was absorbed by the furry mold, which grew thicker and more prevalent the further he went. It felt like running on carpet—soundproofing carpet, which made him all the more aware of the silence pressing in on all sides.

The weird earthy scent grew thicker as he followed the curve of the corridor. It became swampy, a humid, musty blend that made him wrinkle his nose in displeasure. For some reason, the station was worse on this side.

He found that strange, especially since the station itself wasn't very big. Nor was its structure complicated to understand. The circular corridor formed the main passage that connected the outer and inner sections. The outer section held several rooms, which were marked by the occasional round door. He blew past several of them, paying them little notice other than the fact that they all sat dark and silent.

Lights bloomed ahead. It was his team, clustered together around the only door into the inner section. Which, judging by the big yellow warning symbols stenciled beside it, was the lab that housed the dangerous alien plant.

Fade slowed, lifting a hand to shield his eyes from their lights. He squinted, barely able to make out the faces of his teammates. Night-vision eyeballs were more hassle than they were worth, in his opinion.

Lydia waved him over. "Take a look at this, Fade."

She spoke like she'd found something neat, like a rabbit with a bucket on its head or a flower that grew in six different colors. So Fade didn't think too much about it when he joined them, and glanced down at what had captured their attention.

He blinked.

The door to the lab was currently closed. Out of every surface he'd seen so far, it was the most covered by the fuzzy mold. He couldn't even get a single glimpse of the metal surface that assuredly lay beneath it. A strange dark substance oozed from the seams, like the room beyond was filled with liquid, and it now seeped out through the cracks.

As bizarre as it was, Fade quickly realized the leaking door wasn't the object of fascination here. It was the lump of meat nestled against the base of the door.

Very recently, it had been a person. Now it was half of one, severed at the waist either by the closing door or by something else. It lay on its back, face frozen in a contorted expression, its eyes pale and glassy. Blood still spurted from its gory wound, feeding the ever-widening pool at their feet.

Light spilled across it, cruelly adding color to Fade's monochrome vision. For a long moment, he stared, unable to tear his eyes away. His mind observed, calm and clinical, while the rest of him was reeling in horror.

His stomach twitched, as if considering whether it should violently object to what he was seeing. Fade swallowed.

"It's green," he said faintly.

"Hm."

He didn't know which of his team members made the sound. It didn't matter.

"That's not normal." He paused, suddenly uncertain. They were in space, after all. "Is it?"

Professor Daktari crouched, and plucked a small ball of fuzz from the half-person's shoulder. He studied it for a moment, then flicked it away. "If he was Endulan, yes. But he's very clearly a human just like the rest of us. So, no. The green blood is definitely not normal."

"He's infected, then." Lydia sighed, as if someone had just told her it was going to rain for the next three days. The fact she stood in a pool of freaky green blood didn't bother her in the least.

Fade's stomach shuddered. He got a bitter taste in his mouth. For a second, he thought he was going to be sick, but then his stomach settled. Like Lydia, it decided to not be bothered.

It's the drugs, Fade decided. There was no other way he could stand here calmly and stare at a dismembered person. It wasn't like he saw something like this every week. He was just a normal person, for crying out loud!

He dragged a hand down his face and took in a deep breath of musty air. Hold it together, Fade. You can curl up and wail like a baby later.

"What happened?" His voice came out calm and steady, which surprised him. Maybe he was a better actor than he thought.

"The door was open when we approached," Mother answered. "This guy came stumbling out, and the door closed on him."

Professor Daktari dipped his gloved fingers into the pool of green blood. He then brought them up to his nose and sniffed. A frown wrinkled his forehead. "But he was screaming before it closed. Did you notice that, Mother?"

"I did."

"That shouldn't have happened," Lydia said.

"The screaming?" Fade asked faintly.

She lifted her brows. "I meant the door. There's a safety mechanism that prevents it from closing if something is in the way."

"Is it possible that whatever rerouted the power also disabled the station's safety? I'm also assuming the air filtration has also been disabled, judging by the air quality." Mother watched the door, both hands holding her gun. She had the muzzle angled down to the side, away from them, but Fade had no doubt she was ready to shoot at anything that jumped out at them.

It made him feel better about the situation. Not much, but a little.

"Oh yeah," Lydia agreed. She carefully stepped around the pool of cooling green blood and went to the door. Fade didn't know why she bothered. Her boots were already saturated in the stuff.

She ran her fingers over the panel on the wall. Sparks generated at her touch. Her eyelids fluttered, eyes half closed. Meanwhile, the Professor took samples. He collected some of the green blood, the mold on the door, and even swabbed the bloody wound of the poor half-person.

After a few moments, Lydia stepped back. She was frowning.

"What is it?" Mother asked.

"When I first looked, everything but basic life support was offline. That meant air is cycling, so I didn't bother going deeper. But it's actually coming straight from the labs, which are in there." Lydia pointed at the killer door. "It's not running it through the purifiers, but simply pushing out gross lab air into the rest of the station."

"Explains the smell."

Fade nodded his agreement. Maybe that also had something to do with the rapid growth of mold, but he was no scientist.

"That's not all," Lydia went on. "The doors are all on manual control. Whoever closed that door on this poor guy did it intentionally. They wanted to kill him."

"Actually," Professor Daktari interjected, "it didn't. Our victim was already dead."

Fade scratched his head. It was the only thing he could think to do while trying to make sense of what he'd just heard. This whole thing was unraveling into one of those murder mystery scenarios, except now it threw horror and space into the mix. First there was alien plants, then there was killer doors. Now there were dead people who got killed a second time.

Perfect. This could not get any crazier.

"What does that mean?" Lydia was the one who voiced the question for him.

The Professor rose. He was done with his examination. He looked at them, an odd half-smile playing around his thin lips.

"Exactly what I said. This man died roughly three days ago."

Okay, so Fade was wrong. It could get crazier.

"He was moving," Mother reminded them. "And screaming. I wasn't aware that dead men could do either of those things."

The Professor chuckled, a low, creepy sound that raised the hairs on the back of Fade's neck. "They can if they've been hijacked by an Outer Rim organism."

"Oh," Fade said. "Is that what's happening?"

Now he was becoming delirious. They all were. Probably all the mold in the air.

"So it got out of containment, just like the Guide suspected." Mother eyed the door intently.

"Seems like," the Professor agreed.

"Can you subdue it?"

"Put it back, you mean? Oh no. It's far too late for that, I'm afraid."

"I see. Then we have to neutralize it."

"Yes."

"Can you—"

The door moaned, and it slid upwards. Something thick and fleshy darted out from the opening on the bottom, slipping through the blood. Fade instinctively leaped back, while Mother already brought her gun to bear.

They were too slow.

Before Mother could even fire a single round, the weird thing thing curled around the closest person's legs—Lydia—and pulled her feet out from under her. She fell, brilliant eyes growing wide in shock. It yanked her through the door's opening, which was just wide enough to accommodate her slender body.

Mother lunged forward, throwing her gun aside so she could grab Lydia's arms. But the Lydia was pulled through, just as the door suddenly halted its upward motion. Like a guillotine blade, it slammed down with startling force. Mother hit it in the next instant, a grunt escaping her.

She'd failed to stop it.

"Fade," she snarled. Her head jerked up and he was startled by the mask of animalistic rage contorting her features. "Get in there and bring. Her. Back."

"What?" His eyes went to the door, which was completely closed. Dust wafted off of it, but it wasn't actual dust. It was spores jostled loose from the mold.

Shock rippled through him. Whatever had snatched Lydia had closed the door with such ferocity that he doubted it was going to open for them, even if they asked nicely.

Besides that, Mother was insane. There was nothing he could do. He didn't even know what—

A huge hand wrapped around the nape of his neck. All thoughts immediately stilled in his head. Mother's face loomed before him, even as her hand squeezed dangerously.

"Go," she said, ever so softly.

And then she all but threw him straight at the door.