CHAPTER FOUR

A second bang and a drawn-out scraping noise came from the main part of building. Jen launched herself to her feet. Alessicka’s bed was empty, the sheets pushed neatly back into place. Jen ran for the hallway.

“Please no,” she muttered as she ran. “Please don’t be in there. Don’t be in there. Please.”

The noise had quieted; the rooms were so still that she could have been the only living person in Station 331 as she rounded the corner and opened the door to the control room.

The airlock door was open, and Alessicka was inside, slumped on the ground with her back to Jen, while Carly knelt in front of her. Jen froze as Carly looked up, a wide, unnatural smile stretched across her face. Their gazes met for a second before Carly’s eyes flicked to the open door.

They moved at the same time. Carly dashed towards freedom, and Jen lunged for the control panel. Jen was a second faster; her hand hit the flashing red button, and the airlock doors slid closed just in time for Carly to hit them.

“Damn it, Jen!” she yelled.

Jen pulled back from the panel, feeling terror and nausea rush through her. Alessicka sat crumpled on the ground, looking like a doll that had been propped up into an imitation of a sitting pose.

“What did you do to her?” Jen called. Her mind raced, fighting to think of a way to get the girl out, desperately hoping she wasn’t too late.

“She’s fiiiiine, Jen,” Carly said. She’d reverted to a complacent drawl as she paced back into view. “Aren’t you, Lessi?”

As if on cue, Alessicka’s body jerked. Slowly, like a puppet being pulled by strings, she began to twitch herself upright. It looked so unnatural that Jen wanted to scream.

“Lessi?” Jen asked as the girl rotated to face the window.

Allesicka’s face was slack, and her eyes were blank as she stared at a space somewhere behind Jen’s shoulder. Then she blinked, and her whole body shuddered. Her hands twitched up, her neck straightened, her back aligned itself, and a look of awareness returned to her face.

“Jen!” She clasped her hands in front of her chest, blinking quickly and giving the worried look she wore whenever she thought she was in trouble. “I’m sorry, Jen. I opened the door to give her some food, and we sat down to talk. I must have fallen asleep, and—did you lock the doors?”

“Yes,” Jen’s lips moved to say, but no noise escaped her.

Alessicka looked normal again. Completely normal. Yet Jen couldn’t erase the memory of her body, crumpled on the ground, as if the life had been sucked out of her…

“You can let me out now,” Alessicka said, hurrying to the plexiglass window and giving Jen a sweet, apologetic smile as she pressed her hand to it. “I’m really sorry. I know I should have asked you before going in, but she said she was hungry, and… I’m so sorry. Please let me out.”