Day 136 - Third Rotation
Emergency call to Medical Bay at 0730 hours. Research team summoned immediately.
The crew member exposed to the Proto-Gel sample - the one who lost their hand to radiation poisoning - is showing changes.
Amputation was performed three days ago. Standard procedure. The Medical Officer removed the necrotic tissue, sealed the wound, administered post-surgical protocol. Patient was stable. Recovery expected to be routine.
This morning the attending nurse noticed something during vitals check.
New tissue formation at the amputation site.
Not scar tissue. Not normal healing. Actual regeneration. Cellular reconstruction where there should be nothing but sealed flesh and bone. The surgery site hasn't healed properly - the wound is still open, angry, inflamed - but underneath, new tissue is forming. Muscle fibers. Vascular structures. The beginnings of skeletal framework.
Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
The patient is running a fever. 39.8°C and climbing. Delirious. In and out of consciousness.
There is no precedent for this in human medical history. Tissue regeneration at this rate, at this scale - it doesn't exist. It shouldn't be possible.
I'm trying to connect the variables:
- Proto-Gel contact → radiation poisoning → amputation
- Cargo arrival → sample behavioral change
- Sample aggression → tissue regeneration in exposed patient
- Timeline: All of this happening within two weeks
And the U.S. Ministry of Defense representative arrives today. This afternoon. To oversee a cargo freighter mission we still don't have full clearance details on.
This isn't coincidence.
Whatever's in that storage unit, whatever we accepted delivery of - it's connected to the sample. And now it's connected to one of our crew members.
Scientific breakthrough or nightmare? I don't know anymore.
[Entry ends]