Steven McDonald - Steven E. McDonald

“That’s not true!” Miller screamed.

“You let me burn!” The flames were almost white as the burning figure howled, the howl becoming a terrible scream of rage and accusation.

The burning man pointed. Fire poured around him, liquid and swift, flowing over the walls, the floor, the ceiling.

Miller turned and ran frantically into the First Containment. An alarm shrieked. The flames were almost at his heels, chasing him like something alive as he fled into the separator and toward the Second Containment.

The main door to the Second Containment was closing, either in answer to the Core, or in response to the flames. He pushed harder, dove headlong through the remaining gap, skinning his side on the door. The floor here was slick with coolant, and he could not get his balance. He slammed into the main workstation console, fetching up hard.

The door was not quite closed. Flames gouted through the tiny opening, spewing towards him. He rolled aside, covering his head, feeling the heat of the fire going past him.

The console exploded, showering him with hot plastic and metal, parts splashing into the coolant and ricocheting from the bulkheads and the door.

He looked up. The door was shut firmly now. The paint on it bubbled with the heat from the other side, darkening.

Miller stood up, carefully. He looked at the detonator in his hand, shaking his head. They were about out of time, and he regretted his reassurance to Starck. She would get Cooper and herself taken care of, no matter what.

He was afraid of where he was going.

Red light washed over him again, and his shadow grew tall in front of him.

He turned, expecting to see his latest adversary. He took an involuntary step backward, shocked at the sight that greeted him.

The Second Containment was a fury of fire, a wall-to-wall holocaust, fire flowing over the control spikes, over the surfaces, pouring through the air.

The Core glowed cherry red, orange, its color shifting through blazing white, a small, corrupt sun in the heart of chaos.

“Don’t leave me!”

He turned toward the crackling voice. The burning man was beside him.

Miller started to back away, but he was not fast enough. The burning man swung his arm, smashing it into Miller.

Miller tumbled and slid, his clothes burning, his hair singed. He fell into the coolant, losing the detonator as he struck the deck. His head went under the muck and coolant went into his mouth, tasting foul.

He rolled over and pushed himself up, spitting coolant out, choking from the taste, trying not to vomit. The coolant had at least doused the flames on his clothes.

The burning man was walking toward him, the coolant bubbling and steaming where his feet came down.

Miller knew, now, knew the truth, or at least some of the truth. There had been just too much…

“Look at me!” the burning man commanded, but Miller was not having any of that now.

Facing the burning man, Miller shouted, “No! You’re not Edmund Corrick. I know you’re not… because I saw him die!”

The burning man stopped.

The flames faded away, leaving only a ghost of heat. The Second Containment was dark, humming with the power that was building.

William Weir stood before him now, but this was not the Weir he knew. The body was larger, misshapen. The face was Weir’s, but the skin appeared to have the texture of wood. Runes had been etched into Weir’s forehead and cheeks.

The monster had eyes. They glittered green, too large, too deep. There was a reptilian coldness there, a look that spoke of millions of years. The creature had some of Weir’s form, but it reeked of an alien nature that left Miller with a sense of horror that transcended anything he had ever felt.

“Weir?” he said.

“Weir is gone,” the creature said, but its voice was remarkably like that of the scientist. “The poor fool. He was reaching for the heavens, but all he found was me.”

Miller stared, forcing himself past his reactions. “Well, what the fuck are you?”

“You know what I am.”

Without thinking, Miller swung, a right cross that the creature caught easily. Miller screamed as his fist was slowly crushed. Long nails cut into his flesh and blood ran.

The creature hurled him away, into a bulkhead. Something cracked in Miller’s side, and he slid down, sitting in the coolant, stunned, barely able to breathe.

The creature walked slowly toward him. “I am your confessor.” It bent to look at him, tilting its head. “Confess your sins to me. I feel the weight of Edmund Corrick’s death inside you.”

Miller raised his head. “What do you want from me?” He was weary. He wished this would be over.

“Respect,” the creature said, crouching to face him. “The reverence I deserve. Or did you think you could profane this place without it coming to my attention? Did you think you could come pounding on my door and I would not answer?”

“Why don’t you just kill me and get it over with?” Miller hissed.

The creature grinned. “Kill you? I don’t want you dead. Just the opposite.

I want you to live forever.” The creature reached out to him, grasping his head. Miller struggled, twisting. He could not break the creature’s grasp.

“Let me show you.”

Miller screamed.

Images cascaded through his mind, horrific, endless. In moments he saw the bloody fates of the original crew, saw them torn apart, degraded, destroyed from within and without. He was drowning in blood and suffering, too much of it for him to accept, too much to withstand.

“Do you see?” the creature asked, its parody of Weir’s voice almost a caress.

Miller writhed, trying to break the contact, trying to make the horror stop.

His hand struck something under the surface of the coolant. The pain jarred him free of the cascade of images for a moment, long enough. He reached down, grasping, found a familiar handle. A CO 2scrubber, dropped by either Smith or Peters.

The visions surged back, swirling through his mind.

“Do you see?” the creature whispered.

He saw. Justin, Starck, and Cooper had been crucified upside-down over the Core, blood dripping from their bodies.

“No!” Miller cried, thrashing. “They’re not dead! You didn’t get them!”

“Not yet,” the creature said. “Soon. Very soon.”

“No!” Miller screamed.

He thrashed around again, and this time his head came away from the creature’s hands. He sank beneath the coolant for a moment, then surged up, bringing the CO2 scrubber up and around, slamming it into the creature’s head.

The creature staggered back, shaking its head, blinking.

Miller came to his feet. “Leave them alone!”

He swung the scrubber again, with all the force he could muster, snapping the creature’s head around, making it stagger. He saw blood pouring from an open wound, filling the runes.

“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Miller screamed at the creature, letting the fury take him over. He swung the scrubber back and forth, scything, each blow sending the creature staggering back.

He swung again.

The creature reached up, snatching the scrubber out of the air, ripping it from Miller’s hands, hurling it away. In a blur, it had Miller, too, lifting him, flinging him into the coolant.

Miller slammed into the deck, coolant washing over him. Pain flooded his body from head to foot. He knew things were broken, ribs, organs, there had to be internal bleeding.

He could not move.

The creature stood over him. An improbably long tongue eeled out of its mouth, licking at the bloody runes on its face. It smacked its lips, pleased.

“Yes,” it hissed. “I had forgotten how good that can taste.”

Miller lay in the coolant, moaning.