I make it back to my own quarters eventually, a little unsteady. I lock the door, change my passwords, throw the manual lock, and barricade it from the inside.
I still don't feel safe. I feel like they could get me at any point in time. Now that Grelik isn't talking to me, all my fears have come rushing back in. And it wasn't even Grelik! It was the freaky Shipmind pretending to be Grelik! I put my back to the wall and shiver as I gradually slide down to sitting. I reach behind me into a cubby and pull out a stuffed craboid, and hug it tightly, the claws almost hugging me back.
What am I going to do?
Everyone I know on the ship is gone now, subsumed by that... thing. James even got killed by them. They trapped me. I stare straight ahead at the door, the makeshift barricade, feeling the adrenaline seep through my system. What would that be like, if I joined them? Would they clamp down on that feeling? Force me not to be scared? To be "happy"? My arms tremble and I hug my crab tighter, and I have to laugh through the tears forming in my eyes. I'm terrified of not being able to be terrified. The wall console beeps, and I jump about thirty feet in the air, instantly on alert.
It's a text message. From the ship's computer. "Sorry to bother you, Sarah, but we thought you might want to know: James is okay. He's in pretty bad shape, still, and hasn't regained consciousness yet, but we managed to get him back to the ship before any major brain damage."
I blink at it. Put my fingers over the keyboard. Hesitate. "You say 'he', not 'we'...?"
The typing indicator flashes, then stops. Flashes again, stops again. There's a pause, then, "Yeah. He's not part of us yet, either."
It could be a lie. A trick, or misdirection, but... why? The adrenaline in my gut is souring, and now mostly I just feel sick. I send back, "I'm going to bed. I'm exhausted."
"Goodnight, Sarah."
It's still weird not being addressed as "Lieutenant Declan". I move to my bed, set up four different kinds of alert to let me know if someone forces the door, then turn off the lights and lay down fully clothed in my bed for an hour, staring through the darkness at the dim blue lights on the door panel until I fall asleep from sheer exhaustion, and dream about swarms of stinging insects.
The subtle chime of a person at the door wakes me up. "Sarah? Are you awake?"
I sit up, disoriented and disheveled. "Whazzat?"
I wipe my bleary eyes and the room comes into focus. The barricade is still there. There's a tickle on the back of my neck, and I grab at it, thinking about wasps and ants, but it's just a strand of my hair. I let out a shaky breath.
"Sarah, we just wanted to know if you wanted to join us for breakfast. If you need more rest, that's okay, too."
I open my mouth to respond, but my stomach does it for me. "Uh, give me a minute to get ready, okay?"
"Of course, Sarah. We'll wait for you."
"Q-Quit it! Quit calling me that!" I don't mean to shout, but my nerves are shot. It's too creepy! They don't know me well enough for that, even if I was on a first name basis with some of the crew! I don't think I even know this voice, some ensign or other I've never spoken to.
There's a pause, and the voice responds with "Of course, Lieutenant Declan." They sound more professional, and a little hurt.
Great. I hurt the creepy hivemind's feelings. I sigh, and get out of bed.
A shower and a change of clothes really does wonders for my sense of well-being. I hadn't realized how much of a funk I'd built up over the last few weeks. That uniform was rank. I drop it in the cycler and adjusted my spare comms pin in the mirror. I look almost professional, save for the huge bags under my eyes. I could almost pretend I was just going on shift.
Almost. I turn the corner from the bathroom and realize that I have to dismantle my own barricade before I can get out. A few moments later, I take a deep breath, hit the lock pad, and open the door.
Nobody's there. I poke my head out, look left and right down the corridor. A horrifying image grabs me and I look up on the ceiling, but nobody's there, either. "Hello...?"
The ship computer's simulated voice speaks from the console across from me. "We thought that maybe waiting for you outside your room might be creepy, so we're waiting in the cafeteria instead. See you there?"
"Y-yeah, sure."
They weren't wrong, but walking through empty corridors and expecting to be ambushed at any moment isn't exactly stress-free. This ship had been my home for years now, and now it felt like a completely hostile landscape. I'll give them this - they do seem genuine about letting me walk around the ship on my own. I wonder if they'll let me walk into engineering?
I'm not brave enough to try it on an empty stomach. I make it to the cafeteria, which is full of the sounds of people eating and the smell of synth-eggs and coffee. Despite myself, I close my eyes and breathe deep. Real synthetic coffee.
There's something off, though, and suddenly I realize it - nobody's talking. Everyone is just chowing down in silence. Morning shift is usually pretty quiet, but not dead silent. It's unnerving. I sneak around over to the buffet and load up on eggs and toast.
"Lieutenant?"
I manage to avoid dropping my tray as none other than the Captain approaches me from the side, her eyes aglow. Out of reflex, I shout, "Good morning, Captain Everard, Sir!" and snap a salute.
She - they - deflate a little, and sigh. "At ease, Lieutenant. No call to stand on ceremony now. Statistically, only 12% of ourself outranks you."
"Uh, right," I say, eloquently.
"We thought that maybe it'd be easier for you if you were speaking with someone you considered to be an authority, rather than someone you knew well... were we wrong?" It was very, very strange to see the Captain - the Captain! - uncertain. It must have showed on my face. "We could command this vessel straight through the heart of a black hole and not break a sweat, but this... negotiation is new, for us."
I saw it, then, for a moment - a glimmer of the Captain. My Captain, the one I knew, the one I trusted with my life. Then it was gone. I stared at them, their eyes glowing that eerie blue-white of the collective.
"Come on, Lieutenant. Grab some coffee and let's sit and chat."
That sentence sat in my veins like icewater. Somewhere between a personal chat with the Captain saying "we need to talk" and a horrifying identity-consuming hivemind trying to recruit me sat a land of pure terror. I stood frozen for a moment as the not-Captain walked away, surrounded on all sides by total strangers who looked like the people I used to know.
