The outer Messier 32 deep space relay station hung suspended in the night sky overlooking the not-so-distant spiral vortex of it's larger companion galaxy Messier 31, more commonly known as the Andromeda galaxy. As close as it was, it absolutely dominated the night sky seeming close enough that you could reach out a hand and touch its sweeping spiral arms, when in reality, it was thousands of light-years away.

The relay station itself was a small affair compared to your average UNSC or even GA transport vessel, about the size of a small range asteroid, designed and staffed by members of most of the major GA species, Rundi, Tesraki, and Vrul being the major players. The relay station was primarily there to intercept inter-warp communications between Andromeda and the Milky Way galaxy. Though there were more major communications hubs on the moons of the Rundi home world, transmissions tended to get jumbled, and remote relay stations had become a necessity to drown out some of the major noise and spearhead some of the less urgent transmissions.

Their engineering specialist, a Vrul with a sandy grey skin and red-orange eyes turned from where he floated by his console towards one of his Tesraki underlings, "We didn't schedule any maintenance for the auxiliary docking bays did we?"

The Tesraki turned in his chair batlike ears twitching, "No, we finished that maintenance two cycles ago, why?"

"Strange." The Vrul muttered turning back to his console, "The power to that sector just went off..... Perhaps we made a mistake with the wiring, have someone from maintenance head down there and take a look at the main breaker system."

Across the room, the Rundi relay director frowned and then turned to look at them, "Did any of you get a proximity alert on decks 6-7?"

"No, sir ... wait , aren't those the decks for the auxiliary docking bays?"

The Vrul nodded his large insectoid head prismatic eyes flashing in the dim spilling in from the uncovered observation window, "Yes..... perhaps the power shorted to the proximity sensors on the outer hull, why?"

THe Rundi turned back to his station, "I am getting some strange interference signals from a point on our outer hull, can't tell what it is. Could just be a magnetic field artifact." He turned back to the controls engaging the intercom as he sent someone down to check.

***

Down on the seventh deck, the tesraki and Vrul engineering contractors stepped their way from the automated lift and out onto the silent, dark floors. Like the rest of the ship, the lights were supposed to be automated, but the entire deck was silent and filled with shadow. This may not have been a problem for the vrul, who could see somewhat onto the infrared spectrum, but for the Tesraki it was a little more difficult. The Vrul engineer waited in impatient silence as the Tesraki, reached into his tool belt and removed a brightly glowing white stone.

The vrul and the tesraki didn't particularly enjoy each other's company. One of them was here for the science and the other was here for the paycheck, neither of them saw much of a value in the other's lifestyle, but they kept it civil as the tesraki engaged the comm attached to one of his large- batlike ears, "This is engineering."

"Go on engineering what do you see?"

"Not much of anything to be honest, but the lights are out..... I'm thinking an issue with the electrical."

It the Vrul had the ability to roll his eyes, he probably would have, but he settled for floating further onto the deck and into the darkness. The Tesraki followed after casting his light upwards towards the ceiling trying to find any exposed wiring, sparks or any other indication where the problem might be located.

The Vrul hummed transmitting a shortwave radio signal directly to the comms system as only a vrul could, "I don't see any hot spots on the walls, and the issue doesn't seem to be localized. With all the lights out on this level, I am willing to bet that the problem lies with the main breaker system, there can be no other explanation."

At his back, the tesraki suddenly spun to his right staring down one of the dark maintenance tunnels where the red light of the emergency auxiliaries hung overhead. It may as well have been completely black to him, as the tesraki aren't capable of processing red light as humans understand it.

The vrul glowered over at him, "What now."

The tesraki frowned, "No..... I just..... I thought I heard something." one of his large ears twitched. Of course the Vrul wouldn't have heard anything, it was a creature between natural and unnatural hearing SOME radio signals and SOME normal sound, but not particularly well onto either. The Tesraki however, had impeccable hearing rivaled only by the humans which they beat by a hair's breadth in testing conditions.

They continued onward when no other sounds were forthcoming heading their way towards the main breaker system. ON their way there, the Tesraki stopped a few times listening to the sounds of the ship. He heard nothing.....

If he were a human he might have been able to feel the impending weight of dread slowly casting itself downwards over them like a blanket of snow on a silent snowy night. However, he was only a tesraki, and the Vrul was hopeless in intuitive situations.

They had just cut around the corner into the main auxiliary bay when the vrul stopped floating to a halt at the entrance to the bay looking down at the floor with his glittering prismatic eyes.

Busy listening to the darkness, the Tesraki almost plowed into his companion hissing in annoyance as he staggered out of the way, "What."

The Brul didn't answer staring down at the floor with wide eyes, and the fading yellow prints of heat on the floor slowly losing their brightness and fading against the cold metal.

The fear hit him like a ton of bricks just then, and he turned, "We need to go."

The tesraki looked at him confused, "What do you mean?"

"I mean we NEED TO GO!" The little creature roared, pushing against the much taller, heavier tesraki, and doing nothing. He froze just then eyes riveted on the hallway behind his companion, and the row of fiery white hotspots that cut horizontally across the hallway before disappearing into one of the side tunnels.

He could see the prints more clearly now. They were large, and patterned on that of a bipedal creature..... It wasn't big enough to be a drev, but it was just big enough for...... by the heart of the motherworld please no....

"Human." The vrul whispered

"A human?" The tesraki wondered, "What about humans, you aren't making any sense."

And that's when the sound came from behind, the sudden slap, slap, slap rushing up from the darkness. The two of them turned, just in time to see the dark face looming from the shadows.

The eyes against the dark skin were white, stark white and wild glittering with a thin layer of gelatinous slime. It's white teeth were barred.

All teeth and eyes it rushed at them from the darkness feet bare against the floor, chest bare. The tesraki screamed, The vrul let off a high trill, and then the world was turned upside down, screams echoed up the corridors along with the long, maniacal laughter

"Engineering, engineering, come in.... engineering ....."

The testraki reached for his radio earpiece having crawled away from the initial attack on his hands and knees. Something wet slicked the fur on the side of his face. He grasped at the headset as the laughter grew.

He turned to bring the headset to his ear..... And knew he shouldn't have. The human stood before them holding the vrul engineer in his hands lit from one side by sharp oblique lighting form the fallen white stone which had been knocked to the ground in the initial strike.

Even as he watched the human slowly curled his fingers into clawed talons and stabbed them towards the Vrul's flotation sack. Nails pierced flesh, and then the human pulled..... Completely ripping the sack from Vrul's dangling body. Copper bile spilled onto the floor coating the humans hands. The Tesraki screamed into the com trying to scramble away.

The human adjusted his grip. The smile that cut across his face was so wide it looked as if it was about to split skin curling up to take over both cheeks. It grabbed one of the Vrul's legs, and then clamped a hand around its neck.

It pulled, pulled so hard that blood began seeping from under its nails. The veins in it's arms bulged, as did it's eyes.

The room was filled with a horrible ripping sound more green gore.

The tesraki howled in panic over the line not caring who heard just hoping someone did.

He tried to run, scrambling away blindly into the dark. Something slapped to the floor behind him and then the footsteps chasing.

He was body-slammed hard to the ground, rolled onto his back. The human sat atop him grinning that horrible grin, a dark crack ran through one of the human's teeth. Blood welled for his gums, from his fingers. The hand turned to claws and descended downwards.

***

Screaming, "Messer 31 relay, messier 31 relay, come in over..... Please someone please someone help us."

SLAM

SLAM

The door shuttered inwards over and over and over again with the weight of the human's body as it repeatedly slammed itself into the door, over and over and over again. They could see it on the cameras bleeding from its fingers and it's hands. One of its fingers appeared to be bent, blood dribbled from its mouth.

SLAM

But still it kept going lights flickered, a trail of bodies blanketed the ground before the door. The surviving support crew huddled in the room staring at the door with abject terror. The human took a step back, paused and then jammed it's fingers into the door and began to pull. The arms strained the muscles bulged.

The human screamed.

There was no way he could get through that door had a maximum of nearly 1,000 pounds.

The door jarred open an inch.

***

"Messier 32 this is Commander Vir, of the U.S.S Harbinger sending tactical units to your position boarding now."

The human reinforcements thundered down the hallway regaled in full tactical gear flanked by two drev soldiers, one bright blue the other a deep bloody red. They could hear the noise before they could see anything, the deep animal screaming of something completely inhuman. The marines fanned out as much as they could in the hallway crouching low.

They could be seen on the cameras just coming around the last corner as the creature pushed the door oven further joins snapping and popping.

The whites of his eyes glittered through the open door. Then a dull thud. The door slammed shut as the human suddenly let go.

In front of them, the manic figure staggered and turned dark skin coated with splatters of red, green, and black. Blood trickled from his teeth from his skin from his eyes. It yanked the dart from it's shoulder, and rushed them.

Three of the marines were picked up bodily, and thrown before anyone had time to react. Commander Vir jumped in front of the creature bringing up his weapon to block his body from the human's gnashing teeth, and was forced to the ground by a horribly terrible force.... He was so strong.

Cannon ran forward, grabbing the human about the waist and locking him into a bear hug with his two pairs of strong arms.

With a scream and one massive push, he broke the drew's unbreakable bear hug.

It took three darts to take it down...... the dosage recommended for horses.

***

"You get it quarantined?"

"Yes sir?"

"Blood tested."

An exasperated sigh, "Yes sir."

"You should probably test the rest of the crew as well."

Krill turned to look at the commander with a raised eyebrow, "It isn't a "zombie", commander, I assure you."

Commander Vir glanced at the camera and into the viewing room where the ruined body was strapped down eyes wild and rolling kept down only by the nerve block they had placed on its spine.

"Looks like a zombie to me."

The Vrul turned to the his scans and shook his head, "Well it isn't, its completely human. But I think I have found the cause of your problem." He glanced over at the second, dark haired, human doctor sitting across from him peering through the eyelet of a microscope, "Dr. Katie."

She glanced up from her microscope and smiled, "He's right commander, it isn't a virus or a bacteria, but our scans did pick up something interesting, evidence of extensive and intentional leasoning in the brain."

"What do you mean?"

Krill looked up, "Scarring on the brain specifically in the amygdala, nerve tracts between the frontal cortex and the amygdala, the hippocampus, and peripheral pain tracts leading from the spine."

Doctor Katie glanced at the monitor, "He doesn't feel pain.... He doesn't feel fear.... He doesn't feel compassion."

Commander Vir blinked and glanced at sunny who returned his dark expression, "What exactly does this mean?"

"Well, looking at the security feeds you can get an idea of what it means." Krill stood and began pacing back and forth across the floor, one of his many human-isms that he barely seemed to notice anymore, "The human body is estimated to utilize only 30-60% of the muscle fiber at one time, even well trained athletes reach the high end of this spectrum. The brain of you humans acts as a gating mechanism sending pain signals and telling the muscles to stop when something SEEMS to heavy when in fact you can lift much more under dire circumstances."

Commander Vir nodded, "like with adrenaline, when you don't feel pain anymore, and people like lift cars and shit."

"Not how I would have phrased it, but yes. Humans have been known to lift up to 1,000 + pounds in this state. For instance, when he ripped the Vrul's leg off." Commander Vir winced, but Krill went on, "It would have taken almost 600 pounds of pressure to do that, and about 1000 to push open that door. However, these mechanisms are gated for a reason, at your full strength it is quite possible to rip muscle from bone..... In his case he cracked 12 of his teeth, broke five of his fingers, dislocated an elbow, ripped multiple tendons, and caused irreparable damage to his skeletal-muscular and tendon systems. "

Sunny leaned in, "And he felt none of that?"

Krill shook his head, "Not a bit."

The group of them turned back to the containment unit.

"What does this mean?" Commander vir wondered allowed.

Krill followed his gaze, "It means..... Someone is experimenting..... And I would wager to say their experiment was successful."

"What did they succeed at?"

"If I have to wager a guess..... Super soldiers."