The Green Maw

The collector panels stretched away before us, catching sunlight so distant that the Sun itself looked little more than a bright star. Owen floated about 20 m to my left, his high-visibility saffron EVA suit stark against the black, its dark graphite joint panels flexing as he worked. We had been outside for nearly three hours, checking connection points and replacing worn insulation around the cables. Routine maintenance, the sort of work that kept Helios Minerals extraction station Kestrel-27 alive at the edge of the Solar System.

"Nearly finished with collector bank C," I said into my helmet microphone, recording the inspection on my wrist display. "Three junction clusters still to do. How are you getting on?"

Owen did not answer at once. During our eight months aboard Kestrel-27, I had grown accustomed to his occasional lapses of attention on EVAs. He loved being outside more than anyone I had ever known and sometimes stopped working simply to take in the view.

"Owen," I prompted.

"Dan," he said at last, his voice strangely flat. "Look over there."

I pushed gently away from the panel I had been inspecting and turned in microgravity to face him. His arm was extended towards the darkness beyond our asteroid.

"What am I looking at?" I asked, scanning the star field.

"That." His voice had acquired an odd, distant quality. "That green thing."

I narrowed my eyes and adjusted my visor to reduce the glare. At first I saw nothing but remote stars and the haze of a nebula. Then I found it: a faint green streak against the darkness, barely visible but unquestionably there.

"Probably a comet," I said, already turning back towards the collector bank. "Or debris reflecting the sunlight at an odd angle. We've still got three junction clusters to inspect before-"

"It's moving," Owen cut in.

I looked again. The green speck had changed. It seemed larger now, with a pulse that resembled nothing I had encountered in all my years working in space.

"An optical effect," I suggested, trying to sound more certain than I felt. "Perhaps a cosmic ray striking your visor. Let's finish up."

Static crackled across the communications channel. Then Dr Imogen Shaw's voice came through, carrying an urgency I had never heard from her before.

"Mercer, Price, return to the station immediately."

The use of our surnames caught my attention. Shaw was always formal, but there was a sharpness in her voice now.

"We haven't completed the maintenance cycle," I replied. "About forty minutes left on the-"

"Now, Mercer." Her tone permitted no argument. "Something has appeared on our long-range sensors. Everyone is to remain inside until we identify it."

I looked towards the green light again. It had unquestionably grown, pulsing with a rhythm that seemed almost deliberate. A chill crept up my spine despite my suit's temperature controls.

"Understood. We're packing up."

I turned to Owen, expecting him to be gathering his tools. Instead, he remained motionless, staring at the light.

"Owen, you heard Shaw. Time to go inside."

His breathing was the only answer, quick and shallow over the suit channel.

"Owen?"

I pushed towards him, crossing the distance with practised movements. "Come on. Snap out of it. We need to go."

When I reached him and turned him by the shoulder, the sight of his face through the visor shocked me. His eyes were wide, his pupils dilated, and he was staring past me without blinking.

"It's calling me," he whispered.

"What?" I tightened my grip on his arm. "Nothing is calling you. It's an unexplained phenomenon, that's all. Shaw wants us inside."

Owen slowly shook his head. "You can't hear it?"

The green light pulsed again, brighter than before. It was no longer merely a point. It had spread into something resembling a cloud of mist, with luminous streaks reaching across the darkness.

"There's nothing to hear, Owen. Sound doesn't travel through a vacuum." I tugged at him, trying to guide him towards the airlock. "Come on. Secure your tools and move."

For a moment, he appeared to recover. He nodded and began collecting his equipment. Relieved that the strange episode had passed, I turned away to gather my own tools.

The snap of a release catch made me spin round.

Owen had detached his safety tether.

"What are you doing?" I lunged for him, my movements suddenly clumsy with panic. "Owen, reattach it. Now."

His face went blank again, his gaze fixed on something far beyond me. Without speaking, he drove both feet against the collector framework and launched himself into open space.

"Owen!"

I threw myself after him. My gloved fingers brushed his boot but found no purchase.

"Shaw, emergency! Price has detached and is moving off structure!"

I propelled myself after him, but his push had been far stronger than mine. The distance widened as he travelled rapidly away from the asteroid, directly towards the pulsing green light.

"Owen! Fire your manoeuvring unit! Use the emergency return programme!"

He did not activate his thrusters. The gap continued to grow until my tether snapped taut, wrenching me to a halt.

"I'm going after him," I said, reaching for my own release catch.

"Negative, Mercer." Commander Alistair Ward's voice broke across the channel. "Do not detach. Ellis is coming out with the retrieval kit."

I hung at the limit of my safety line as Owen receded. The green light intensified, casting its sickly glow across his saffron suit.

"Owen, please," I said, my voice breaking. "Use your thrusters. Come back."

For one fleeting instant, I thought he turned his head towards Kestrel-27. Towards me.

Then the green light flared with blinding intensity.

When my vision cleared, the phenomenon had contracted to a distant point again. Owen was gone. He was not a dwindling figure or a body drifting beyond reach. The space in which he had floated was simply empty, as though he had never occupied it.

I remained suspended in shock, staring at the place where my friend had been. Behind me came the hiss and vibration of the airlock cycling.

Rowan Ellis emerged in their saffron EVA suit and crossed quickly towards me with the rescue equipment. They halted beside me and searched the darkness.

"Where is he?" Rowan asked, their normally steady voice tight with concern.

All I could do was point towards the distant green speck, now faint once more.

"He was there. Then the light became brighter, and he..."

I could not finish.

Rowan stayed beside me for several long minutes while we searched the blackness for any trace of Owen. Their hand settled on my shoulder. I could barely feel the pressure through my suit, but it helped.

"We have to go back inside," they said at last. "Commander's orders."

I nodded numbly and allowed Rowan to guide me towards the station. Every few seconds I looked back, hoping to see Owen's suit lights or hear his voice over the communications channel. There was nothing but the stars and that remote green point, a faint blemish against the emptiness.

We entered the airlock, completed the pressure cycle in silence and removed our helmets. Rowan's face reflected my own shock and confusion. Their gaze kept straying towards the viewport, as if Owen might appear outside it at any moment.

"What happened out there, Dan?" they asked quietly.

I shook my head. How could I describe watching a friend disappear into nothing, drawn towards a light that should not have existed?

As we removed our EVA suits and prepared for the questions waiting beyond the inner hatch, one thought repeated itself in my mind.

Owen had not merely drifted away or become lost in space. Something had taken him.

The emergency debrief began the moment Rowan and I passed through the inner airlock hatch. Commander Ward was waiting for us, his face set, the lines around his eyes deeper than usual.

"What happened?" he asked. His voice was calm, but the tension in his shoulders betrayed him.

Rowan glanced at me before answering.

"Owen was working on the collector bank with Dan when his behaviour changed. He broke protocol, released his tether and pushed himself into open space. Then he vanished."

"Vanished?" Ward's brows drew together. "People don't vanish in space. They drift beyond recovery."

I found my voice.

"He didn't drift away, sir. He was there one second, and then the green light flared. When it faded, Owen was gone. He wasn't moving away from us. He had disappeared completely."

Ward studied my face, searching for confusion or deceit. When he found neither, he turned towards the passage leading to the operations room.

"Follow me. Both of you."

We walked in silence through the narrow corridor connecting the airlocks to the station's central hub. The overhead lighting seemed painfully harsh after hours behind our filtered visors. Every step felt heavier as the reality of what had happened settled over me.

Dr Imogen Shaw was waiting in the operations room, pacing before the main console. Floor displays showed Kestrel-27's position and the surrounding volume of space. She stopped as we entered and looked directly at me.

"Tell me precisely what you saw."

There was no preamble. I described the incident step by step, from Owen noticing the green light to the instant he disappeared. As I spoke, Shaw's expression shifted from scepticism to something disturbingly like confirmation.

"And you are certain he said it was calling him?" she asked when I had finished.

"Those were his exact words. He released his tether immediately afterwards."

Rowan nodded. "When I reached Dan, he was alone at the end of his line. There was no sign of Owen."

Ward turned to Shaw, who had begun pacing again.

"You know something, Doctor. Tell us."

Shaw stopped. Her fingers worked restlessly against each other.

"The transmissions and the light are connected," she admitted. "We intercepted unusual radio signals four days ago."

"Four days?" Ward's voice sharpened. "And you did not think that worth reporting?"

"I wanted to verify my findings before causing unnecessary alarm." Shaw crossed to her workstation and brought a complex waveform up on the main screen. "These are not ordinary radio waves. They match no known human communications protocol and no naturally occurring stellar phenomenon in our records."

I stepped closer. "What are they, then?"

"I believe the light is emitting an unknown form of energy which may affect the human mind," Shaw said, choosing each word as though the theory were still taking shape. "The signals contain patterns which appear almost designed to interface with neural pathways."

"You're saying it interfered with Owen's mind?" Rowan asked, a tremor entering their voice.

"That is my current hypothesis, yes."

Shaw altered the display, showing a comparison between the signals and human brainwave patterns.

"Look at the similarities. It may explain Owen's behaviour and his conviction that something was calling him."

Ward lowered himself into the command chair, his expression grave.

"What are we dealing with, Doctor? A weapon? A trap?"

"I don't know," Shaw admitted. "Whatever it is, it appears capable of influencing human perception and possibly cognition itself."

Silence settled over the operations room as we absorbed the implications. Owen had not simply lost his senses or made a fatal error. Something had entered his mind and drawn him away from us.

"What are our options?" Ward asked at last.

Shaw hesitated. "We could request immediate evacuation. The ore tender is not due for another eighteen days, but we have the emergency transfer craft."

"What about Owen?" I asked, unable to keep the anger from my voice. "We aren't simply going to leave him out there, are we?"

Ward regarded me with something close to sympathy.

"Mercer, we do not even know whether Price is still-"

"He's alive," I cut in, surprising myself with my certainty. "Whatever that thing is, it took him somewhere. It didn't kill him."

Ward rubbed a hand over his face. For the first time since I had known him, he looked uncertain. After a long moment, he reached a decision.

"We wait twenty-four hours before calling for evacuation. Monitor the light, continue analysing the signals and run continuous scans for Price's suit beacon. If there is any chance he is alive, we need to find it."

Shaw nodded and returned to her workstation.

"Something out there is watching us," I said before the thought had fully formed.

Three pairs of eyes turned towards me.

"Whatever it is, it isn't a random phenomenon. It chose Owen. It wanted him."

Rowan put a hand on my shoulder.

"Dan, you're exhausted. We all are. You should try to rest."

Ward nodded. "That is an order, Mercer. Five hours minimum. Ellis and Shaw will take the first watch, and I will relieve them afterwards. We all need clear heads if we are to understand this."

I wanted to argue, but the adrenaline was already draining away, leaving a bone-deep exhaustion behind. I nodded and returned to my quarters.

The cramped room looked exactly as I had left it that morning: the bed unmade, a cold mug of tea on the desk and Owen's borrowed cribbage board still laid out midway through the game we had started two nights earlier. Its normality felt obscene, as though the room itself ought to have changed in recognition of what had happened.

I dropped onto the bed without undressing. Exhaustion weighed on every limb, yet sleep would not come. Whenever I closed my eyes, I saw Owen receding into the darkness, reaching towards that eerie green light.

When sleep finally took me, it dragged me down completely.

In the dream, Owen floated in empty space with his back towards me. I called his name, but he did not turn.

As I drew closer, I saw green light surrounding him. It did not merely illuminate his suit. It seeped through the fabric and beneath his skin.

At last he turned. His face was no longer his own. Every feature had melted away, leaving a smooth, blank surface which reflected the green glow.

The light around him expanded and changed shape until it became an enormous mouth, vast enough to swallow worlds. Countless eyes blinked within it in perfect unison, above row after row of crystalline teeth pulsing with the same green energy.

Owen's body dissolved into the mouth as it opened wider and reached for me.

A voice that was not a voice filled my head.

You're next.

I woke gasping, my sheets soaked with sweat. The dream clung to me like a physical presence, too vivid and coherent to dismiss as an ordinary nightmare. It felt like a message. A warning.

The clock showed that I had slept for roughly four and a half hours, short of Ward's ordered minimum. I swung my legs from the bed and sat for a moment, trying to shake the remnants of the dream.

Something drew me towards the desk terminal.

I opened the exterior camera feeds and cycled through them until I found the view I wanted: the star field in the direction of Owen's disappearance.

The green light remained there, but it no longer resembled a distant speck. It had grown, its edges more clearly defined, and it pulsed with a rhythm that seemed purposeful. It was closer. Much closer.

As I watched it on the screen, it pulsed once in perfect time with my heartbeat.

It knew I was watching.

A quiet beep from the communications panel broke my concentration as I examined the sensor readings. Since waking, I had spent hours searching every available record for information about the green light and any trace of Owen. I touched the flashing alert.

It was the automated morning check-in reminder. Rowan had failed to register their status.

That was unlike them. They followed routine and procedure without fail.

"Rowan?" I called over the internal channel.

There was no answer.

I checked the life-sign monitoring system. Every member of the crew carried a staff pass fitted with a biometric tracker, standard practice at commercial mining stations where a missing person could become lost among kilometres of excavation tunnels.

Rowan's tracker showed active vital signs, but its location placed them beyond the station's east perimeter, near the east works sector.

That made no sense. No external maintenance was scheduled, and after Owen's disappearance Ward had ordered everyone to remain inside unless an EVA was absolutely necessary.

I tried again.

"Rowan, do you copy? Your morning check-in is overdue."

Static answered me.

My stomach tightened as I searched the exterior camera feeds. The image covering the east works sector was poor at that distance, but I could distinguish Rowan's battery-powered works buggy parked near the auxiliary airlock. There was no sign of Rowan.

I snatched up my tablet and made for the operations room, walking faster with every step. Commander Ward was already there, reviewing system reports with Shaw.

"Sir, we have a problem," I said, forcing my voice to remain steady. "Ellis missed their morning check-in. Their tracker places them outside the station, beyond the east perimeter."

Ward's head snapped up. "Outside? I gave explicit orders."

"I know, sir. They aren't responding to communications, but their life signs are stable. Their works buggy is parked near the eastern airlock."

Ward's jaw tightened as he exchanged a look with Shaw.

"How long since their last recorded movement?"

I checked the tracking data. "Minimal movement for the past forty minutes. Before that, there is a direct path from the airlock to their present position."

"We bring them back," Ward said, already moving towards the kit locker. "Mercer, get your suit on. You're coming with me."

Shaw stepped forwards. "Commander, after what happened to Price, is that wise?"

"We are not losing another member of this crew, Doctor," Ward said. "We go out, retrieve Ellis and return directly. You will monitor us from here and keep the channel open."

Shaw looked ready to object further, but instead gave a reluctant nod.

"I will watch your telemetry and track the phenomenon. Its energy signature has been fluctuating all morning."

Ten minutes later, Ward and I stood in our EVA suits as the eastern airlock completed its cycle. The moment we stepped onto the asteroid's surface, I felt exposed. The black immensity of space surrounded us, and the green light was somewhere in that darkness.

"Stay focused, Mercer," Ward said, noticing my hesitation. "Keep your eyes on me or on the ground. Do not search for the light unless I tell you to."

We crossed to Rowan's buggy, a compact battery-powered vehicle used to carry tools and components to the more distant parts of the mining works. It was powered down but undamaged.

"Check the log," Ward ordered as he scanned our surroundings.

I accessed the vehicle's records through my suit interface.

"Last operated three hours ago. Ellis drove it from the main vehicle bay to this position, then shut it down manually."

Ward pointed towards the dust beside it.

"Footprints."

A single trail of boot marks led away from the buggy. They were evenly spaced, with none of the scuffs or long furrows that would suggest Rowan had run or been dragged. They had walked away deliberately.

We followed the trail, our own boots leaving fresh impressions beside theirs. Rowan's prints continued directly through the area markers, reflective posts positioned at 20 m intervals.

"There," Ward said, pointing ahead.

About 50 m beyond the final boundary marker stood Rowan. They were utterly still, their back towards us as they stared into open space. Even from that distance I could see they were not tethered to anything.

"Rowan," I called over the suit channel. "What are you doing out here?"

There was no response.

We advanced cautiously, both remembering what had happened to Owen. Within 10 m, I could see the rigidity of Rowan's posture. Their head was tilted slightly upwards and their arms hung loosely at their sides.

"Ellis, this is Commander Ward. Acknowledge."

Rowan turned slowly. Behind their visor, their eyes were wide and unfocused, wearing the same distant expression I had seen on Owen's face.

"My sister is calling me," they said, their voice soft and dreamlike.

Ward and I looked at each other through our visors. Rowan had no sister. Their crew record listed them as an only child, and during our eight months together they had mentioned no relative beyond an aunt living in the Valles Marineris settlement.

"Rowan," I said carefully as I edged closer, "you haven't got a sister. Come back to the station with us."

They shook their head and smiled faintly.

"She's waiting for me out there. Can't you hear her singing?"

I reached for Rowan's arm and tried to guide them back towards the boundary. With astonishing strength, they tore free of my grip, nearly toppling me in the weak gravity.

"Can't you hear it?" Rowan asked, their voice rising with excitement. "The beautiful singing?"

I looked past their shoulder and froze.

The green light had become far larger since I had last seen it. It throbbed in a steady pattern, casting luminous green filaments across the stars.

Rowan raised both gloved hands to their helmet.

"Rowan, no!"

I lunged, but I was too far away. They released the neck-ring catches and pulled the helmet from their head.

The atmosphere in their suit burst into the vacuum as a cloud of freezing moisture. Rowan's eyes bulged and their face contorted in pain, but only for a moment. Before decompression could render them unconscious, they planted both feet against the surface and launched themselves towards the green light.

"No!"

I fired my manoeuvring unit and reached for them, but Ward seized my arm and held me back.

"Mercer, stand down. There is nothing we can do."

We watched in horror as Rowan's body travelled towards the throbbing green mass. Unlike Owen's unaided flight, this time the light itself seemed to respond. A long tendril of green radiance reached across the darkness and coiled around Rowan.

For one dreadful instant, their body blazed with brilliant green light. Then a flash forced me to turn away.

When I looked again, Rowan had ceased to exist. No body continued along their course. No lifeless figure receded amongst the stars. There was only an empty patch of space where they had been.

Ward's voice came through my helmet, taut but controlled.

"Back to the station. Now."

We returned in silence, retracing our footprints to Rowan's abandoned buggy and then to the airlock. Every few steps I fought the urge to look behind me, to see whether the green light had grown larger or begun to follow us.

The airlock cycle seemed interminable. When we finally removed our helmets, Ward's face was pale, his customary composure replaced by naked fear.

"We need to contact the UK Space Operations Centre," he said. "Whatever that thing is, it is taking us one by one."

Shaw was waiting when we entered the operations room. One glance at our faces told her what had happened.

"Rowan?" she asked quietly.

Ward shook his head. "Gone. The same as Owen."

Shaw sank into a chair.

"It is happening faster than I expected. The energy readings are off the scale now."

I crossed to the main viewport and stared at the stars. The green light was plainly visible without optical assistance. It hung in space as if watching our isolated outpost and waiting.

"Two crew members in twenty-four hours," Ward said, his voice hollow. "This is not an accidental encounter. It is targeting us."

Shaw nodded and brought up data on her tablet.

"I have been analysing the patterns in its emissions. There is intelligence behind them, a structure far too complex to be random."

"Rowan said they heard singing," I said without turning from the viewport. "They thought an elder sister was calling them. But Rowan was an only child."

"It is constructing personalised lures," Shaw said. Her clinical tone could not conceal her fear. "Somehow it is gaining access to memories, grief or desire and using them to shape what each victim perceives."

Ward straightened, visibly forcing himself back into command.

"We evacuate now. Shaw, begin transferring your research to portable storage. Mercer, prepare the emergency transfer craft. I want us ready to launch within ten hours."

I nodded, grateful to have direct orders to follow. As I turned towards the launch bay, a sharp pain pierced my skull. It lasted only an instant, but it was severe enough to make me flinch.

"Are you all right, Daniel?" Ward asked.

"Just a headache," I said, rubbing my temple.

The pain was already fading, but it left an odd sensation behind, like the echo of a voice beyond the limits of hearing.

As I began preparations for our escape, I could not rid myself of the feeling that our chance of getting away was diminishing by the hour.

I stared at the tablet in my quarters, trying to concentrate on the evacuation procedures while my head throbbed. The pain had returned several times since the failed attempt to rescue Rowan. Each episode lasted only seconds, yet left behind the sense of words hovering just outside my comprehension.

The communications panel chimed. Shaw's voice emerged, unusually tense.

"Mercer, report to the research laboratory immediately. Commander Ward is already on his way."

I set down the tablet and left without replying. The corridors of Kestrel-27 felt altered, hollowed out by the knowledge that our crew of five had fallen to three in little more than a day. The overhead lights flickered as I passed the junction leading to the east wing, and I quickened my pace.

When I reached the laboratory, Ward was already there, leaning against a workstation with his arms folded. At fifty-two, he now looked considerably older, the lines in his face deepened by Rowan's death. Shaw stood at the main console, opening files and images with rapid, nervous movements.

"What is this about, Shaw?" Ward asked as I entered. "We should be preparing to evacuate, not holding meetings."

Shaw did not look away from the screen.

"I have withheld information. That ends now."

Ward straightened. "I beg your pardon?"

"I have completed my analysis of the signals."

Shaw turned to face us, her narrow face pale beneath the laboratory lights.

"They are not messages. They are warnings."

"Warnings?" I moved closer to the display. "From whom?"

Shaw opened a complex waveform showing patterns of energy fluctuation.

"I believe they came from another intelligent species. Perhaps the final survivors of whatever civilisation occupied the system this entity reached before ours."

"The entity has a name now?" Ward asked.

"I have been calling it the Green Maw," Shaw replied, typing rapidly as she opened another data set. "It is neither radiation nor any other natural phenomenon. It is an intelligent entity, and it is hunting."

The hairs rose along the back of my neck. Ever since I had watched Owen vanish, I had sensed intention behind the light. Hearing Shaw confirm it sent a cold shiver through me.

"You knew this," Ward said, his voice dangerously quiet. "You knew, and you kept it to yourself while two members of my crew were taken."

Shaw's shoulders drew in.

"I was not certain until after Rowan's disappearance. The patterns were too complex and too specific for me to reach a defensible conclusion earlier."

She brought up two waveforms side by side.

"Look. These are emissions from the entity compared with human brain activity."

I leant closer. I lacked Shaw's expertise, but the resemblance was obvious. The patterns aligned at several points.

"It is using our own minds against us," Shaw continued. "It creates a direct interface with human consciousness. That is why Owen heard it calling, and why Rowan believed a sister who never existed was waiting outside."

"It reads our thoughts?" Ward asked.

"It appears to exploit memories, grief and desire," Shaw said. "It constructs a lure from whatever it finds. Owen was fascinated by the unknown, so it used his curiosity. Rowan may have longed for the closeness of a sibling they never had. It gave them one."

Another stab of pain passed through my temple. I rubbed at it.

"It's an anglerfish," I said. "It draws its prey towards a false beacon."

Shaw nodded. "Precisely. Except its beacon is fashioned inside the victim's own mind."

Ward pushed himself away from the workstation and paced across the laboratory.

"Why did we not all hear it? Why Owen and Rowan?"

"Different levels of susceptibility, perhaps," Shaw said. "Or it may be growing stronger and becoming more capable with every feeding."

The word hung between us. Feeding. It transformed what had happened to our crewmates into something even more appalling.

Ward stopped and faced us, his decision made.

"We are leaving. No further observation and no more waiting. Ten hours to prepare the transfer craft and recover whatever research we can."

"Agreed," Shaw said, already connecting a portable drive to her workstation. "I need to transfer my research and the warning signals. If we decode them fully, they may contain crucial information about the entity's vulnerabilities."

"Mercer," Ward said, turning to me, "gather essential supplies and begin the pre-flight inspections. I want the craft ready to launch the moment Shaw's transfer is complete."

"Yes, sir."

I headed for the door, working through mental checklists of everything we would need. As I reached the threshold, the overhead lights went out.

This time the darkness lasted several seconds before the lights returned.

I stopped and looked back at Shaw.

"That is the third failure in the past hour."

She glanced towards the ceiling. "Check the station status on your way to the launch bay."

At the nearest terminal, I opened Kestrel-27's operational readouts. What I found made my stomach drop.

"We have unexplained power losses throughout the station. Life support remains stable for now, but efficiency is declining in almost every system. Communications, environmental controls, even water reclamation."

Shaw stopped the transfer and joined me at the terminal.

"It has already begun," she said quietly, entering commands to retrieve more detailed diagnostics.

"What has begun?" Ward asked, coming to stand beside us.

"The entity's influence is extending beyond organic minds and into our technology. These fluctuations are not random failures. They are systematic. It is trying to trap us before we can escape."

I looked towards the small viewport set into the laboratory's outer wall. The sight beyond caught me unprepared.

The green light had changed again. It was no longer a distant body but a vast presence occupying a substantial portion of the sky. Its edges shifted and pulsed as streams of green radiance spread across the stars towards the asteroid.

"It's closer," I said, unable to look away.

Ward watched the approaching light for several seconds, his expression hardening.

"Our window is five hours, not ten. Shaw, take only what is essential. Mercer, the transfer craft must be flight-ready within three hours. We will not give that thing any more time to prevent our escape."

I nodded and hurried from the laboratory, resisting the impulse to glance at the viewport again.

The corridor lights continued to flicker as I made for the launch bay, throwing restless shadows across the walls. The pain in my head returned without warning, more intense than before. This time, within it, I could almost distinguish words. A whisper hovering just beyond understanding.

I pressed both hands against my skull as though I could block it out.

Whatever the Green Maw was trying to say, I did not want to hear it. I had seen what happened to those who listened.

I struck the emergency barrier control for compartment C and watched the heavy doors grind together across the maintenance corridor. Compartments A through E were now sealed, each requiring a manual override as the station's automatic systems continued to deteriorate.

My hands shook as I logged the completion on my tablet and marked off another task on the evacuation checklist. The overhead lights dimmed, brightened and dimmed once more. The pattern had become increasingly frequent over the past hour. Kestrel-27 was failing around us under the Green Maw's influence.

I did not understand how the entity could interfere with machinery, but the evidence was impossible to deny.

"Mercer, status report." Ward's voice crackled through my communications unit, the station channel now thick with static.

"Compartments A through E sealed, sir," I replied as I started towards the next junction. "I am going to secure the laboratory wing. What is our power situation?"

"Life support is holding at forty-six per cent capacity. Backup generators are engaged, but under strain." Ward's voice remained measured and focused, that of an experienced commander who had faced emergencies before. Despite everything, it steadied me. "Shaw reports the research transfer at sixty-eight per cent. We require at least eighty-eight before departure."

"Understood. I will check with her after securing the laboratory wing."

The corridors were unnaturally still, washed in red emergency lighting. Kestrel-27 had been home for eight months. Now every groan in its structure and stutter in its machinery sounded like the death rattle of a living thing.

I found Shaw hunched over her workstation in the laboratory, several portable drives connected to the main system. Her fingers moved frantically over the controls while her eyes darted between displays.

"How is it progressing?" I asked, crossing to the emergency barrier panel on the far wall.

She did not look up.

"Seventy-four per cent. The entity is disrupting the data throughput. I have had to create redundant transfer protocols to compensate."

She gestured towards a small pile of portable drives.

"Those contain complete backups of the most important files. Take them if I do not reach the transfer craft."

I paused. Her words stripped away the last pretence that this was simply another emergency procedure. We were fighting for our lives.

"We are all reaching that craft," I said firmly as I activated the barrier sequence.

The laboratory doors began to close, sealing away equipment and samples we would have to abandon.

"Ward is prioritising life support along the evacuation route. We still have time."

Shaw finally looked at me, her face ghostly beneath the red lights.

"That thing took Owen and Rowan in less than thirty hours, Mercer. This is not a natural disaster or an equipment fault. We are being hunted."

Before I could answer, the communications unit erupted in static. Ward's voice came through, but something in his tone stopped me cold.

"I am detecting an anomalous signature on the long-range sensors," he said, each word slightly slower than usual. "I need to examine it personally."

Shaw and I exchanged an alarmed glance. That hesitation was wholly unlike him.

"Commander, what sort of signature?" I asked, already moving towards the door. "We need to remain with the evacuation plan."

A long pause followed.

"It looks like... No. That cannot be right."

His voice had grown distant, almost dreamy.

"I need to verify this. Stay on task. I'll join you at the launch bay."

Shaw seized my arm.

"Something's wrong. The entity must be affecting him."

I nodded, dread tightening in my chest.

"Finish your data transfer. I'm going to the operations room."

"Not alone," Shaw insisted, disconnecting one of her drives. "The transfer will continue automatically. We need to stay together now."

We hurried through the corridors as Kestrel-27 groaned around us and more systems failed. The lights flickered almost continuously, plunging us into darkness for several seconds at a time before the emergency circuits cut in. Twice we had to use manual overrides on doors that had frozen half-open.

As we approached the operations room, I noticed that the temperature had fallen sharply. Our breath formed pale clouds in the air, evidence that the environmental controls were failing in this section. At the end of the corridor, intense green light leaked around the edges of the observation viewport's protective shutter. The shutter should have been fully closed under emergency conditions.

The operations-room door was sealed, and the access panel beside it was dark.

"Dead?" Shaw asked as I tried the manual override.

"No. Locked from inside."

I tapped my comms unit.

"Commander Ward, this is Mercer. We're outside the operations room. Please respond."

The only answer was a burst of static. I pressed my ear against the door and strained to hear anything beyond it.

There was a faint murmur, as though someone inside were talking to himself.

"We need to get in," I said, moving to the emergency access mechanism concealed behind a wall panel. "He's not responding, and this breaches every evacuation protocol we've got."

Shaw helped me wrench the panel away, exposing the manual door release. It took both of us hauling on the heavy lever to disengage the lock. The door slid open a few centimetres and stopped. We forced our fingers into the gap and dragged it wider until there was just enough room to squeeze through.

The operations room was drenched in green light. Every protective shutter had been retracted, allowing the sickly luminescence outside to flood the compartment. It was colder here still. Ice crystals had formed across the metal surfaces of the control consoles.

Commander Alistair Ward stood before the main viewport with his back to us, utterly motionless.

Green light moved across his uniform, lending him an unnatural, spectral appearance. He gave no sign that he had heard us enter.

"Commander?" I called softly, taking a careful step towards him.

He turned slowly, and the sight of his face filled me with horror. His eyes were wide and unfocused, his pupils so dilated that scarcely any blue remained. The green radiance reflected in them and made them shine. His expression held the same mixture of wonder and longing I had seen on Owen's face before he disappeared.

"My daughter," Ward whispered, turning back to the viewport. "Sophie is out there."

I took another step, keeping my movements slow and unthreatening.

"Sir, Sophie isn't here. She died, remember? Four years ago, in the climbing accident in Snowdonia."

Ward smiled.

"No. She's right there. She's calling me."

He lifted a hand towards the viewport, pointing at something only he could see.

"She needs her father."

Beyond the glass, the green phenomenon had completely surrounded Kestrel-27. What had begun as a distant speck only days before now filled the sky, curling around the station while brighter pulses travelled through it in a steady rhythm.

"Commander Ward," Shaw said, her voice firm but calm, "what you're seeing isn't real. The entity is accessing your memories and using them to draw you out, as it did with Rowan and Owen."

Ward shook his head slightly, still smiling.

"You're wrong, Doctor. I can see her clearly. My little girl needs me."

He began moving towards the emergency airlock controls.

I caught his arm.

"Sir, focus. We have to reach the transfer craft. Whatever you're seeing, it isn't Sophie."

The change in him was immediate and terrifying. His face contorted with anger and, with strength that seemed impossible for a man of his age, he hurled me backwards.

I struck the nearest control console hard enough to drive the breath from my lungs.

"Don't try to stop me," he growled, his voice scarcely recognisable as that of the commander I had served under for months. "She's alone out there."

Shaw moved to block his path to the airlock controls.

"Think, Commander. Sophie died in Snowdonia. You showed us her photograph. You told us about the accident. This is not her. It is using your grief against you."

For a moment, doubt crossed Ward's face. He looked at Shaw with a flicker of recognition, as though he had surfaced from deep water.

"Doctor... I don't understand."

"Fight it," I urged, pushing myself upright against the console. "We need you, Commander. We need to evacuate now."

The moment of clarity vanished as quickly as it had appeared. Ward's gaze snapped back to the viewport, his eyes widening once more.

"She's crying," he whispered. "I have to go to her."

What happened next was so quick that I barely had time to react. Ward lunged forwards and shoved Shaw aside with the same unnatural strength he had used on me. She stumbled and fell, striking her forehead against the edge of a workstation.

By the time I reached the airlock controls, Ward had already activated the emergency override.

"Commander, stop!" I shouted, trying to cancel the sequence. "You'll die out there."

Ward looked at me one last time. His eyes seemed completely filled by the green glow.

"She needs me," he said simply.

The inner airlock door opened, and Ward stepped inside. I threw myself at the control panel, desperately trying to interrupt the cycle, but he had engaged the emergency protocol. Once the inner door closed, the outer hatch would open automatically, bypassing the normal decompression sequence.

"Commander Ward, you haven't got a suit. You'll die instantly."

I pounded on the airlock window, trying to reach him. Through the reinforced glass he smiled at me, calm and peaceful.

"It's all right, Mercer. I'm going to see Sophie."

He reached for the inner-door control. Shaw appeared beside me, blood running from the cut on her forehead.

"Daniel, we can't stop him."

The inner door sealed with a hiss. Through the airlock's small window, I watched Ward turn away from us and face the outer hatch. He looked relaxed, like a father waiting for his daughter to come through a station door.

The outer hatch opened. Escaping pressure ripped him from the chamber and flung him into space. For one appalling moment, I could see his face. He was still smiling, still reaching for the pulsing green presence waiting beyond Kestrel-27.

Vacuum and cold should have destroyed his awareness almost at once. Somehow, he remained conscious. His limbs moved with deliberate purpose as he travelled towards the light.

A narrow strand extended from the greater mass and curled around him, forming a cocoon that flared with unbearable brightness. When the glare subsided, Ward was no longer there. There was no body tumbling away from the station, no frozen shape continuing along his trajectory. He had been erased from sight as completely as Owen and Rowan before him.

An alarm sounded throughout the operations room. Red warning lamps flashed while the computer announced, "Critical system failure imminent. Life support at 46%. Evacuation required."

Shaw gripped my shoulder.

"There's nothing we can do for him. We have to move. Now."

I forced myself to look away from the viewport and nodded.

"How much of your data did you recover?"

"Enough to matter," Shaw said, snatching a tablet from a nearby workstation. "Eighty-five per cent. We didn't reach the 88% departure threshold, but this is all we're going to get."

Kestrel-27 shuddered around us. Metal groaned as the environmental systems entered catastrophic failure. The temperature continued to fall, and several console displays went black as the remaining power was diverted to critical functions.

"We've got minutes, not hours," I said, leading the way out. "The launch bay is on the other side of the station."

We ran through corridors lit only by failing emergency strips. Whole sections dropped into near-total darkness. The cold intensified with every compartment, our breath billowing before us. Twice we had to climb through jammed pressure barriers, hauling them open just far enough to squeeze through.

Another violent convulsion passed through the station and threw us against a bulkhead.

Somewhere ahead, the distinctive alarm for a hull breach began to sound.

"We're losing structural integrity," Shaw gasped, clutching the tablet and portable drives to her chest as we pressed on. "The entity must be applying physical pressure to the station."

I did not answer. All my attention was fixed on the increasingly dangerous route to the launch bay, but Ward's peaceful face kept returning to me. He had shown none of the terror I would have expected from a man cast into vacuum. Whatever the green entity had shown him, it had overwhelmed even the most basic instinct to survive.

The thought made me shiver, and not because the environmental systems were failing. If it could make an experienced commander walk willingly into space, what else could it do? I remembered the headaches that had begun after Rowan's death and wondered whether it had already found some part of me I could not recognise or defend.

The final stretch to the launch bay was a nightmare of strobing lights and freezing air. Shaw and I half ran, half stumbled through corridors whose walls were now white with frost. Every laboured breath produced a thick cloud before my face.

"Nearly there," I gasped as we rounded the last corner.

The launch-bay doors stood partly open, jammed by the power fluctuations afflicting the entire station. We squeezed through the gap into the cavernous launch area.

The emergency transfer craft waited on its pad with its systems already running. I had started the pre-flight programme earlier, when Ward ordered the craft made flight-ready within three hours. That decision saved us precious time now.

"Get aboard and secure yourself," I told Shaw, helping her through the craft's narrow hatch. "I need to override the bay doors manually."

She held tight to the tablet and the drives containing her recovered data.

"Be quick, Mercer. We have minutes at most."

I ran to the emergency panel beside the main bay doors and hauled down the manual-release lever. The hydraulics groaned as the doors slowly opened, revealing the stars outside and the immense green presence that now covered almost half the visible space around the asteroid and Kestrel-27.

A massive impact shuddered through the structure and flung me against the wall. Somewhere deep within the station, metal shrieked as structural members collapsed under the pressure.

I pushed myself away from the wall and sprinted back to the transfer craft. Another, stronger convulsion struck the bay as I dived through the hatch.

"Strap in," I ordered, dropping into the pilot's seat and locking my harness.

My fingers raced across the controls as I completed the launch sequence.

"This is going to be rough."

Shaw secured herself in the co-pilot's seat, her face ghostly in the instrument glow.

"It's crushing the station," she said with unnatural calm. "Look at the external pressure readings."

The diagnostic display showed enormous loads across Kestrel-27's outer hull, forces that the vacuum itself could never produce. Something outside was closing around the station.

I engaged the main thrusters and felt the craft tremble as power built through the engines.

"Hold on."

We lifted from the pad just as the launch-bay ceiling began to buckle. Metal panels crashed down onto the place where we had been seconds earlier. I drove the throttle to maximum, and the transfer craft shot through the open bay doors into space.

Behind us, Kestrel-27 folded in upon itself.

Through the rear camera, I watched the station that had been our home for eight months break apart. Green filaments tightened around the structure, crushing it until little remained but twisted fragments of metal.

"Maximum burn," I muttered, more to myself than to Shaw, as I pushed the engines beyond their recommended limits.

The craft shuddered under the strain while we accelerated away from the asteroid and the entity that had consumed our crewmates.

For several minutes neither of us spoke. The vibration of the overworked engines and the constant warning tones from the control panel were the only sounds in the cabin. I watched the navigation displays as I calculated our course away from Kestrel-27 and towards the inner Solar System.

Behind us, the green light remained visible, fading only slightly as the distance grew.

"It's following us," Shaw said at last, her eyes fixed on the monitoring display. "Slowly, but unmistakably."

I looked at her screen. A distinct energy pattern extended along our course.

"How is that possible? We're travelling at nearly maximum velocity."

Shaw adjusted the sensors for higher resolution.

"It doesn't move like any life form we understand. It may exist partly in dimensions we cannot properly observe. What we perceive as light and energy could be only the portion intersecting our reality."

A dull ache still occupied my skull, but it felt different now. It was less invasive, more like the aftermath of extreme stress than the probing sensation I had endured aboard the station.

"I think it's struggling to reach me at this distance," I said, rubbing my temple. "The headache has changed."

"That supports my theory," Shaw said. She connected her tablet to the craft's main computer and began tapping through the recovered files. "It isn't merely hunting us, Dan. It is an apex predator adapted to feed on intelligent consciousness."

"Feed? You mean it literally consumed Owen and the others?"

Shaw looked up, her expression grim.

"Not their bodies. Their minds, their awareness, their entire sense of self. If my analysis is correct, it has existed for many thousands of years, moving between star systems after exhausting whatever intelligent prey it finds."

The implications struck me with sickening force.

"The transmissions we intercepted were warnings," Shaw continued. "They probably came from its previous hunting ground - perhaps the final messages sent by whatever civilisation inhabited that system before it was consumed."

"Then why didn't it take all of us at once? Why use elaborate lures?"

"Fear," Shaw said. "Terror, panic and confusion may alter consciousness in a way it finds desirable. Like an anglerfish drawing prey towards a false beacon, it does not expend effort on a direct attack when the victim can be made to approach willingly."

She paused, apparently hearing how clinical she sounded.

"I'm sorry. That was callous. Owen, Rowan and Ward were my colleagues too."

I waved the apology aside.

"Keep going. We need to understand what we're dealing with."

Shaw brought up a set of complex waveform patterns on her tablet.

"The warning signals suggest that the entity does more than consume awareness. It takes memory, knowledge and personality. Each time it feeds, it becomes better at deceiving the next victim. I have begun calling it the Green Maw. The name is imprecise, but it describes the predatory structure in the data."

"That's how it knew about Sophie," I said. "And why Rowan believed they could hear an elder sister calling them, even though their crew record says they were an only child. They had only ever spoken about an aunt in the Valles Marineris settlement."

"Precisely. The Green Maw tailors its approach to each victim using what it has learned from previous captures. Owen's curiosity taught it how readily we respond to wonder. It gave Rowan an intimate bond they had never possessed, then used Ward's real grief for Sophie. The longer it hunts a population, the more effective it becomes."

The craft's sensors sounded a soft alert. I checked the readings and felt my stomach turn.

Energy patterns were moving behind us.

"It's accelerating."

Shaw leant towards the display.

"We should have expected that. It's changing its pursuit strategy."

I demanded still more from the engines, although they were already beyond their safe operating limits. The entire craft shook, its frame complaining around us.

"We need to warn Earth," I said, glancing towards the communications controls. "The inner-system settlements, the Mars colonies, everyone needs to know what's coming."

Shaw's expression hardened. She stopped my hand before I could activate the transmitter.

"It may be able to follow any signal we send. Think, Dan. The Green Maw interfaces directly with technology. It disrupted Kestrel-27's systems and intercepted our controls. What would prevent it from using human communications networks to spread its influence?"

I withdrew my hand as the logic of it settled over me.

"So we just run? Hope we reach another human outpost before it catches us?"

"For now, yes," Shaw said. "We need more distance and more time to analyse what I recovered. There may be weaknesses or patterns we can exploit."

I turned back to the navigation console and laid in a course through the inner Solar System towards Earth, still several months away at our present speed. The empty distance between us and home had never felt so threatening.

A sudden spike of pain tore through my head, far worse than the dull ache that had preceded it.

I gasped, and my vision blurred. Shaw's voice seemed to come from an immense distance, asking whether I was all right.

The pain vanished as abruptly as it had begun, but it left something behind: an impression burned into my mind.

I saw the Green Maw's true form, ancient and vast, its countless eyes fixed upon our tiny craft. It existed in layer upon layer, dimensions folded within dimensions, with only the smallest fraction visible to human perception. It was larger than stars, older than solar systems and utterly hungry.

The vision lasted only seconds, but it left me certain that the Green Maw would never stop hunting us, or anyone with whom we made contact.

"Dan? Daniel?"

Shaw was shaking my shoulder, genuine concern breaking through her usual composure.

I blinked and returned to the cabin.

"I saw it," I whispered, my voice hoarse. "Not just the light we've been seeing. I saw what it really is. It let me see."

"A final attempt to influence you as we reached the edge of its immediate range," Shaw said, studying my face. "What did you see?"

I searched for words adequate to the impossible thing in my mind and found none.

"Something old," I said at last. "Older than anything we've ever discovered, and patient. It doesn't care how long the hunt takes."

Shaw nodded slowly.

"Fragments in the warnings suggest it has pursued other species across entire galaxies. Time may mean nothing to it."

We fell silent, each trapped in our own thoughts as the transfer craft continued towards the inner system. The green light behind us had dwindled to a tiny point.

The sensor readings revealed the truth. It was still following, adapting and learning.

I locked our course and engaged the autopilot, then allowed myself to consider what had happened over the previous forty-eight hours. Our crew had numbered five. Now Owen, Rowan and Commander Ward were gone, consumed by something we barely understood, and Kestrel-27 had been destroyed.

Only Shaw and I remained, fleeing through space towards Earth and perhaps leading the predator directly to humanity's home.

The engines thrummed steadily around us, driving the craft forwards at velocities that once would have astonished me. Now they felt hopelessly slow beside the thing in pursuit. I looked through the viewport at the stars, each a possible refuge that seemed increasingly beyond our reach.

Shaw returned to her tablet and began searching through the data she had saved from Kestrel-27. I knew she was looking for anything that might help us, any weakness we could use. But the vision had left me convinced that the Green Maw had hunted across unimaginable distances and consumed civilisations far more advanced than ours.

What chance did we have?

I checked our trajectory once more and made small corrections to conserve fuel. We were bound for Earth because there was nowhere else within the transfer craft's limited range that offered even the possibility of safety, though the journey would take several months.

Behind us, the Green Maw followed without pause, drawn onwards by the minds it had tasted in my crewmates and by the billions of human consciousnesses waiting ahead.