Future Syndrome by Ward J Foster

Author:Ward, J Foster
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Evil Genius Society
Published: 2022-12-19T00:00:00+00:00

The wall of fungus crabs herded them like a moving razor-wire fence. The sharp pinchers and spines of the creatures made a space three meters across, in a perfect circle. They moved like a single mind. Jin clung to his arm as they went, passing through several bulkhead doors so they must have entered an entirely different section of the habitat. Jake couldn’t tell where they were, unable to see over the wall of insect limbs.

“What are they?” Jin whispered in horror, clinging to his arm.

“These things jumped me and Chery when they put me in the White Ray machine. The commander called them mushrooms.”

“Mushrooms? Fungus, maybe. But a remarkable life-form that is capable of forming macroscopic ambulatory mass?”

The creatures finally came to a stop in some sort of chamber. From under the legs of the crabs a series of meter-long tubular fungus creatures slithered in. The crab things turned their pinchers inward and Jake winced at the first whiplike strike that snapped shut on Jin. But the claws hadn’t touched her, just snipped through her equipment belt. As it clattered to the deck the worms dragged it away and then the crab-things all started snipping, like dozens of scissors. Jake forced himself to stay perfectly still as every bit of equipment and scrap of clothing was sliced away. In moment they were both standing there naked.

He watched carefully as the items were gathered up, including the Templia module in the rags of his coveralls.

The crowd of creatures parted, making a corridor to a hatch door. With a few well-placed snapping pincers Jake was driven back as Jin was forced into the door and she was locked inside.

“Jake!” she cried as the door closed.

Fuckers! A second door beside it opened and the crab-things deposited the bits of clothes and equipment inside before shutting the storage room hatch.

The living wall moved and parted in the opposite direction, revealing the rear of the big compartment had several long control desks under windows that looked out to deep space. But his eyes went to the back wall, a single pulsing mass of… boogers? Some sort of organic matter. In places it looked like moss, others were coils like a snake or pulpy flesh of a catfish.

The crabthings retreated, leaving him alone in what he could now see was the main command deck of the space station. Rows of control stations with readouts for atmosphere controls, navigation, power consumption and comms. Jake began to approach one of the controls with its Russian language interface when suddenly the room echoed with a crackling rapid snap like dozens of castanets. But it modulated up and down, like weird music. It was coming from the wall of goo.

Oh geezus, what was that clicking sound? Was that it’s voice? It was definitely freaking him out.

He turned back to the wall of trembling flesh. Something like an elephant-sized mass had extended from the wall. Like a rosebud, ringed with tendrils and thorns.

It seemed… intelligent. Like it was looking back at him.

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