Captain's Log: 07:00 AM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

I'm writing this log meant as a letter for the acquaintances of our precious System Engineer Jung Wooyoung. Yesterday at 3:27 AM Wooyoung passed in an incident so unjust and cruel that I will spare this letter of details. Just like the rest of the victims, he was attacked by an alien creature on board and fell victim to its might. We sent his body out into space with our prayers so he wouldn't carry the deadly alien bacteria back to the station.

His loss is another brutal hit to our hearts. While Wooyoung's recent behaviour put the crew at risk and fuelled paranoia and hostility, we lost an important advocate for the truth and progress with him. I am deeply disheartened by the culpability of not being able to protect him. He deserved more happiness in his darkest hours, and I wish he and Medical Officer Choi San wouldn't have had to part. The loss of his beloved drove Wooyoung mad with misery.

Wherever he is right now, I wish Wooyoung found solitude and back to San's arms. As a married couple, they would have conquered any uncertainties and overcome them with their pure love. For as long as I live, I will remember both of them as rays of light in dark hours. Their hard work on this ship majorly influenced our development and their kind souls will be a loss to us all.

To Wooyoung's family, friends, and superiors, I extend my condolences. For having lost a precious person so early in his life.

[More to add to this log later.]

Captain's Log: 09:00 AM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

We've finished our tasks and are now nearing Ginda 66VL's radiation field. Communication Officer Park Seonghwa informed me a few minutes ago that he was able to contact the signal tower of our station there. We have cautioned the base that we come bearing trouble and were promised support and medical care. I am deeply thankful and see some faith again. We'll have to go through some safety processes on Ginda, but as soon as they wrap up, we'll be able to make our way home to resolve this predicament. I wonder if our alien crewmate will still be with us then. If he acts how we expect, he will find a suitable victim on the planet to mate with and not run into a predicament again on our way back. Although that theory makes me wonder how many humans must have died in the shadows to become nests for alien eggs. But maybe he much rather prefers animal carcasses to reproduce in regularly, and the lack of such drove him to those cruel murders.

Either way, I look forward to the solid ground under our feet again. I will have to think about whether I can pity my alien crewmate and how I would react if they left the ship or asked for our forgiveness. Even if their acts were an unconscious, animalistic instinct, it is hard to excuse something as vile as its acts under a human moral system.

Hopefully, Ginda will hold answers to these questions. With other people around us, we can hand over responsibility for once and take a breath.

Captain's Log: 01:30 PM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

At lunch, Yunho seemed to be extra jittery. The nearing end of this hellish journey makes us all shaky. So far, Yunho was the most stable one out of all of us. Seeing him lose his calm both worries me and gives me hope. May he soon find some rest from carrying our rationality on his shoulders.

Captain's Log: 03:35 PM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

I find that Jongho's behaviour is odd. He glances around a lot and avoids our eyes whenever we look at him. So far, none of the crew members stood out to be lying about their innocence, hence our theory that the alien invades their minds unnoticed. Since I have known Jongho for a long time, these signals unnerve me. I'm keeping a close eye on him. If the alien resists the urge to kill until we reach Ginda, it might show in its behaviour, but I'm confident that if anyone could detain it, it would be Jongho.

Given if he truly is the alien. I still have my doubts, but I also don't suspect anybody else.

Captain's Log: 06:30 PM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

We just finished dinner and will now retreat to our camp on the bridge. Everybody is tense, but we heard from Ginda again. They are preparing a new ship for us so we can go through decontamination and a medical check-up. Afterwards, we will return right back to our home base to report back. I'm thankful for their support. They even offered to keep an eye out for our lost crewmates in space if they pass the area.

After today, only a few more days until we reach our goal. It wasn't a bad idea to turn around. I'm confident at least some of us will make it.

"You've been writing a lot today," Seonghwa noticed. He leaned against Hongjoong's shoulder to glance at his tablet and the length of text that had accumulated there in the past few hours.

"Yeah, I wanted to put some of my thoughts down. It keeps me distracted, too. Anything new from Ginda?"

Seonghwa shook his head and stepped aside so Hongjoong could scoot from the bench. Yunho and Jongho had washed their dishes already and stood at the door, ready for the group of them to leave. The two went out first, both with tired and detached eyes. The tension whether or not they would make it so near to their goal kept them all at the highest alarm and drained the little energy they still had. Hongjoong and Seonghwa followed them down the passageway, with some distance between them.

"I'm going to take a shower," Jongho announced loudly for all of them to hear. Yunho presented himself to stand guard while he was inside. Jongho approved of it and disappeared into the bathroom. Once Hongjoong and Seonghwa had caught up with the tall man, they decided to stay, too, for extra safety and so they wouldn't break the group formation. All three of them leaned in various positions on the wall and recovered their strained muscles for a while.

Seonghwa and Hongjoong talked about the procedure once they landed. They would need an extensive safety protocol to make sure nobody inside the station came into contact with them or potential alien traces. The doctor who would treat them would need protective gear that wouldn't allow foreign cells to penetrate it. It was a dicey game, but indispensable if they wanted to ensure that nothing of the alien lingered on them before they returned to the larger clusters of civilisation.

Absent-minded, Yunho leaned against the wall and stared at his toes or down the corridor. He tried hard to put some motivation behind his gaze, but it kept drifting off him.

When it had been half an hour and Hongjoong's arm fell asleep from leaning on it, they eyed the bathroom door warily. The water was still running, but they heard nobody splashing around in it.

Yunho was the first to grow worried. With a glance at the couple, he knocked on the door, calling out Jongho's name.

Unheard over the rushing of water, Yunho got ignored. Upon Hongjoong's nod, he gingerly opened the door to sneak inside. Their bathroom was big, with four shower stalls and a corner with mirrors and drying systems for maximal crew capacity. The door shut behind Yunho as he ventured inside.

The rushing of water didn't let up. Not for a minute, not for two. Seonghwa and Hongjoong suspended their conversation to glance at the door, befuddled.

Seonghwa just grabbed onto Hongjoong's hand to take him with him as they went in when the water abruptly shut off. In unison, both of them exhaled, relieved to hear a life signal.

Feet pattered over the tiled floor. They stood, hesitated, and then continued. Back and forth.

Something heavy dragged over the floor.

Alarm bells going off, Hongjoong was at the door without a second of hesitation. He threw it open wide to expose the room to both his and Seonghwa's eyes.

Jongho stared back at them. He was wet and still undressed, but he had hooked his arms under Yunho's limp body. Caught in the middle of towing him further back into the room, the man had frozen in the spot.

A nasty gash on Yunho's head had too much blood pooling under him after he had been clearly just washed off from it. The wetness still clung to his suit.

Hongjoong's heart had stopped beating in his chest. It stood icily still as he regarded the lifeless form of their tall friend and his brother, who slowly sat Yunho down. Defensively, Jongho's hands came up. His eyes were wide with terror of having been seized.

"Hongjoong," Jongho muttered, his voice reverent. Hongjoong still stared at their dead friend who had just been with them minutes ago.

"This is not what it looks like."

"What do you mean?" Hongjoong asked, his voice trembling. Shock rocked him to the core.

Jongho stepped away from Yunho, deliberately slow. His foot met a metal object behind the shower wall that scratched over the ground. Jongho winced, but schooled his expression back into careful neutralness.

"It's not me, I swear. I just found his body here after I came out and wanted to check him for a pulse. He must have come in and slipped, so-"

"What are you saying, Jongho?" Hongjoong choked out. "We were with him in the corridor until he walked in and you just tried to drag him off. You just killed him right in front of us." Hongjoong nearly collapsed. He tumbled into the doorframe and Seonghwa's hands shot out to stabilise him. The other man was shocked mute.

"No, please!" Jongho's facade fell, and he clasped his hands together to beg. "You need to believe me! I got startled when he appeared behind me so I acted on instinct! I thought he was the monster and-"

"Then why did you drag him off? Why did you clean up the blood? Why did you want to hide him? Jongho... Don't lie." Dull Hongjoong's voice filtered through the silent room. Yunho still bled out over the once white tiles and mixed the water on them with his blood.

"Please... Seonghwa, please understand! Of course, you would think it's me so I wanted to-"

"We gave you so many chances already," Hongjoong whispered. His heart was shattered in his chest for this betrayal. This horrible truth he had averted his eyes from. Blatant and cruel in front of his eyes, they couldn't ignore it any longer.

"If you had just startled, you would have told us immediately. You would have tried to help him. You wouldn't have-" Hongjoong interrupted himself when Seonghwa tapped his arm. At the point of his index finger, Hongjoong's eyes fell onto Yunho's neck, on the way his uniform was rumbled and ripped there as if somebody had dug his fingers in.

"You wouldn't have strangled him in a panic that he might give you away after you failed to kill him on the first hit," Seonghwa finished the end of Hongjoong's sentence.

Helpless, Jongho stood over the dead body of their friend. He didn't move when Hongjoong and Seonghwa advanced in, just allowing them to seize his wrists and pull his arms behind his back. They led him out of the bathroom together and into the corridor.

"In the cell?" Seonghwa suggested as they made their way down. Hongjoong shook his head. He could barely form a single thought.

"I don't know how far his alien form can lose volume and squish together. Let's lock him in the cleaning closet."

And that's what they did. They locked the speechless murderer away and denied him access to any panels. The AI saved him as a threat.

Together, Seonghwa and Hongjoong preserved Yunho's body in the med bay for the night and turned down the heat in there after some struggles with the systems. Then they returned to the bridge to report to Ginda. While Seonghwa established contact, Hongjoong wrote another log.

Captain's Log: 08:17 PM Monday, 11th April 2263. Captain Kim Hongjoong on the SS Elysium.

Our Life Support Engineer Choi Jongho just killed our Military Officer Jeong Yunho right in front of our eyes. We locked him away and will hand him over to the authorities. I will write a letter to Yunho's family now.

At least, as long as he wrote, Hongjoong didn't have to think about the fact that the killer, the one who had abused and mutilated their friends so cruelly, was his little brother and the person he trusted most on this ship.