Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 3

The Habitation

He pushed his way through the clamor, past white coated doctors, and blue scrub wearing nurses, all intermingling with a multitude of alien lifeforms, listening in on their conversations as he passed trying to force his way out and into the front lobby area. All around him quarantine popup bubbles sat next to attached DECOM units. Humans and aliens alike huddled clustered together wearing level A HAZMAT gear/ Holo popups from hospitals on all major colonies and planets were scattered in clusters around the room as doctors talked to each other across thousands of lightyears in real time.

It was impressive.

It wasn't enough.

Dr Krill forced his way past a group of doctors.

"The testing kits just arrived." One of the off-station humans was saying through the holo feed, "We have at least two likely cases and four more suspected. The symptoms are extremely variable, so we aren't sure how to proceed."

The doctors were nodding, "Remember, the testing kits have a higher rate of accuracy on alien lifeforms, with humans they tend to throw false positives, so if there is any question, make sure to test again."

That, at least, was true. The test for the strain of unknown alien disease was now being called Variable Acute Onset Malignant Neoplasm. It wasn't a pretty name, or even a very accurate one considering that unusual bone growth wasn't even one of the major symptoms in most cases and varied so widely from person to person that no one would have assumed it was the same disease if extensive testing hadn't been able to detect it in target patients.

Most people had just fallen to calling it: Habitation, or The Habitation, which Krill liked even less as that made it sound both intimidating and even less accurate. They were trying to cure a disease not Insight a panic. Either way that hadn't helped much, news of The "Habitation" had spread around the known universe on a wave of sudden lockdowns and quarantines that had led to mass panicking and riots in certain cases.

The good news was that, as far as Krill could tell, it wasn't as transmissible as they had first assumed, and was most common.

Ammon government officials.

Which was in some ways ironic and other parts concerning.

The chairwoman of the Galactic Assembly had tested positive only a few days ago and had been brought to the facility for further treatment. As of yet, she was showing only minimal signs of infection, and was in high spirits. Predictably, most of the crew had contracted the disease, though not all of them: a mystery that krill was attempting to unravel.

Krill cursed as he almost snagged his HAZMAT suit on a protruding doctor.

If his suit tore, it would be bad for everyone.

Mostly because he had been one of the first to test positive. Yet, despite that, he knew he had to keep working. Out of everyone In the universe, he knew that he was their only chance of finding a cure. Coming from anyone else that might have been pretentious but coming from Krill it was simply a fact.

Krill had never been sick before, it was an odd thought to consider, but he was immune to most alien diseases as his genetic signature was more similar to plants than it was to animals, which other aliens tended to be, not to mention that the Vrul home world kept a tight leash on their own illnesses to the point of terminating anyone who might be considered a vector.

It was a little known fact that Vrul cities had been built in response to the most virulent and concerning sickness in the galaxy, and perhaps the only on that Vrul really had to fear, but even so he had never had many personal experiences with illness.

His thoughts?

Not recommended.

So far he only had a few symptoms , the primary one being a constant buzzing in his antennae, and on and off hazy vision, which was wildly inconvenient, but not soemthing he couldn't work past . Otherwise he felt mostly fine.