He followed the sound of footsteps down the hallway until he rounded a corner and reached Biome 3. From the entrance he could see the others were already there, surrounding Alexia’s blue holographic image. But when he took a closer look, he could tell it wasn’t her image they were staring at. It was the goats. They were screeching in terror, as if a predator were chasing them. Two of them were cowering in the corner, shaking in fear, while the other three were bashing their heads into the biome’s exterior wall.

That wasn’t the only odd thing. The pigs were lying in their own filth; their tongues hanging loosely out of their mouths, blood streaming from their cracked skulls.

“What the fuck is going on!” Timothy shouted over the deafening noise.

The goats continued to shriek, their voices like human babies crying in pain. It was one of the most awful noises he’d ever heard, one he recalled hearing at the Iowa State Fair years ago, when a farmer sheared his goat in front of a crowd of patrons. Timothy clawed at his ears to muffle the sound.

“Alexia, can you shut off the emergency system?” Sophie yelled.

“Certainly, Dr. Winston,” she replied.

The flashing red lights clicked off and the automatic message stopped, the echo fading away. But the screeching of the goats continued until all of them were successfully slamming their heads against the white wall, staining it a dark red.

“Do something!” Holly pleaded with Emanuel. “Please, can’t you do something for them?”

The biologist stared at the animals in disbelief. He had never seen anything like it. Never in the history of his career had he read about animals behaving this way—except during the solar storms of 2055. Animals in the dead zone had all perished from radiation poisoning, the government killing them in droves to help prevent the spread of disease. But millions of animals outside the zone had died too. At the time, scientists had called it the space weather phenomenon, the theory being the animals were so distressed by the solar storms they became suicidal.

“Oh my God,” Emanuel said, watching the last goat take its final breath. “I have seen this before.”

Sophie shot him a frightened look, her face flushed and panicked. “What is it?”

“I think I know what’s happened outside,” he said. “The solar storms have returned.”

The mess hall was deathly silent. Sophie stood with her back against the wall, her arms crossed. The rest of the team sat around one of the metal tables, sipping cold coffee.

“So you’re telling us the solar storms started up again with no warning?” Timothy asked.

Sophie unfolded her arms and walked over to the table. “If what Emanuel is saying is true, then the granite rock of the mountain would have blocked most of the gamma radiation from the flares.”

“This is fucked up!” Timothy shouted, kicking his chair away from the table.

Saafi stood and flexed his chest, “Calm down, man! I’m really getting sick of your shit. Now isn’t the time to be having a panic attack.”