Kin wasted no time in putting distance between him and the thing, as he was inclined not to be tossed around like a toy again and didn’t want to be anytime soon. However, he was cold and he was bleeding and his wetsuit was broken, which made him even colder.

He reached into his bag and drew out a tube of coagulant, squeezing the toothpaste-like substance onto his wound. He ground his teeth together and hissed as the medicine got to work, fizzing and bubbling as his wound stopped bleeding almost immediately. Next he reached for a roll of silver industrial tape and slapped some onto the gash in his suit.

It wouldn’t last for long, but it would last for long enough.

The door that he entered the room in had been blocked by falling debris, so Kin took another one.

Deeper into the station, and deeper into the dark.

The door he took led on straight for a couple dozen meters before widening into a semicircle-shaped room carpeted from top to bottom with monitors, all in various states of disrepair. A lone table lay at the far end of the room.

Wincing at the pain in his back, Kin kicked his legs and moved slowly towards the table.

Closer to it, he could see that the table was bolted to the ground, its silver surface marred by rust. The chair that was supposed to be next to it was lying at the far end of the room, crushed into two monitors.

On the table were strewn several plastic folders. One of them was marked “HARAB-SERAPEL” in bold black letters.

Kin opened the folder and its contents fell out in shredded pieces.

Shame.

Kin turned his attention to the other sheets. They were in reality photo albums, and closer inspection revealed their horrifying contents.

The photos were all of humans, if they could be called that. They were not wearing anything, shaven and strapped into chairs like Kin had seen in a dentist’s back at the Outpost, but these were made of stark metal. A mask descended onto their face and several tubes ran into their necks.

Chillingly, they had no arms or legs, just short stumps where their limbs were supposed to be. Their bellies were also horribly distended, presumably an effect of staying in a chair and not moving for an indeterminate amount of time. Each photo was of a different person. Kin could only tell because of the long code that looked like it had been burned into their sides.

Kin flipped through more photos.

One of them showed the same scene, except this particular unfortunate was surrounded by several people in lab coats and a strange helmet that cladded their entire head like a knight’s helm, leaving no skin exposed. From this angle it was clear that the part of the chair strapped to the leg-stumps were in fact two panels that could be pulled apart, like in this photo, spreading the legs wide. Kin took a closer look and realised with a chill why these unfortunates had such distended bellies.

They were all shes. And they were all pregnant.

This one was giving birth.

Kin retched in his mask and stumbled backwards, his back painfully protesting.

What in the…

“God…what happened here?”

Kin turned away and realised the rest of the room was strewn with papers as well. Careful not to touch them, he floated gently above the floor, turning his entire body to read them.

Most of them were long strings of jargon that he couldn’t understand, and didn’t really want to after seeing the photos. But one made him stop in his tracks and try to fight his heart back out of his mouth.

It was an innocuous fact sheet, with “UNACCOUNTED” stamped on the top.

Why...why is that here? Isn’t that my face?