"Are you okay sweetheart?"

  Ramirez sat in her chair with a look of pain on her face. The sports bra she was wearing was squeezing her chest with a fierce intensity. The pressure had been increasing ever since she had put it on; she wanted to change out of it but wasn't entirely sure what she could put on in it's place. At any rate, she wanted to stay for the staff meeting that was assembling. She felt Robert's hand touch her shoulder and she jumped. Something suddenly gave and the pressure eased. With a loud snap, one of the shoulder straps broke.

  Robert watched as her large mound pushed it's way forward. The torn strap dangled loosely, the white end falling down past the edge of a now exposed aureole that peeked out in dark contrast to the perfect breast. Ramirez tensed at her situation and the thick muscles of her chest lifted their heavy load upward. She looked down at her lover sheepishly; even sitting she was about half of a foot taller than he was. He just stared with dazed eyes as she fumbled with the broken strap.

  "I guess I should have changed before coming here."

  Robert blinked once and she felt her face begin to flush red. She began to settle back down in her chair and she felt something else tear. It was punctuated with a loud ripping and she knew her sweats had spilt down the seam in the back. Robert leaned back and saw her firm posterior bulging out of her shredding pants. He smiled.

  "Don't worry about it babe, I think everyone here will understand."

  Brian and Karen sat holding hands while talking and causally glancing over at Heather. She was in the corner, trying to keep what was left of Vanessa's labcoat over her exposed front. It had torn across her back before she had arrived but she didn't really have anything else to wear.

  Sandra was sitting at her seat at the conference table also looking at her growing shipmates. Gryphon sat against the wall with his thin, yet muscular, arms crossed across his bare chest. His head was level with her's despite the fact that he was sitting on the ground. His long legs were spread in front of him and Sandra's eyes kept drifting over the thin and light hairs that softly spread over them. She licked her lips and jolted up straight as she heard the doors to Operations open.

  The Captain and Chief Medical Officer walked into the room. Vanessa's eyes caught with Heather's and she sighed. Her Captain put a hand on her shoulder.

  "Que' linda es, no?"

  "Yo se, mi Capitan."

  "Is Kim not joining us?"

  "No, I gave her the rest of today and tomorrow off. It was a long night and I thought one of us should get a chance rest. She said she was going back to her quarters to freshen up."

  The Captain nodded at her response and sat in his chair. Krista squeezed his arm as he did and he smiled at her in acknowledgement.

  Vanessa set a few things down by her chair and walked towards the front as she looked over the group. She saw Ramirez sitting patiently, her body strong and proud as she waited for the briefing. Vanessa couldn't help but admire the strength and power her body displayed; even at rest it seemed like a monument to feminine greatness. She rubbed her reddened eyes.

  "Good afternoon everybody. I know you're all anxious to hear what I've discovered. As you know, three of our shipmates have begun to grow in size since their encounter with an unknown energy field that they came in contact with on the alien ship two days ago. After numerous tests and examinations I have discovered the cause." Vanessa looked up towards the AI plaque embedded in the wall of the conference room, "Alyssa, can you dim the lights and display my findings please."

  "Yes sir."

  Operations began to darken and the large viewing screen hummed with power. A large sculpture of multi-colored spheres appeared; they spun around each other as bright points of light swirled about them. It shrank slightly as it faded to one side of the screen and graphs began to appear next to it. Groups of letters appeared, connected to other groups of letters by thin lines. They formed geometric shapes and blinked as percentages flashed beneath them. Vanessa nodded as she glanced over her work. Brian swallowed, not entirely understanding what he was seeing. Sandra squinted, entranced by what appeared.

  "Sandra," Vanessa started, "can you tell me what this is?"

  "Well," she adjusted the thin-frames of her glasses, "it's organic. Capable of rapid oxidation. And there seems to be," Sandra's brow furrowed and she turned on the small display screen in front of her to get a better view. "Wait a minute, this can't be right."

  Robert stood up and walked behind her, watching over her shoulder.

  "What is it?"

  "Vanessa, is this for real?"

  "I checked it three times to be sure."

  "How can it be possible? There's no way it can have this composition and remain this stable." Sandra began to type in queries into her console.

  Robert shook his head.

  "Would someone please explain this to me? I may be a great pilot but I got a 'D' in biology."

  "Chemistry actually," Vanessa tapped on the main viewer and one of the larger spheres expanded; the others fell by the wayside and a new grid appeared along it's edge. An arrow pointed toward it's center and labeled it 'XE' in bold letters.

  "It's xenon," the Captain said.

  "What does that mean?"

  "What it means," explained Sandra, "is that a particle of xenon is at the core of this molecule; and that is impossible as far as I know."

  "Why?"

  "Xenon is one of the noble gases. They are a group of atoms that are highly unreactive because they have full and complete electron shells and they never bond with other atoms naturally. It is possible to bond them artificially, but that requires an incredible amount of energy and the resulting compounds break down almost instantly."

  The Captain nudged Krista and she bent close to him as he whispered.

  "I knew that."

  "Well," Vanessa said, "this new molecule is apparently highly stable." She pressed a button and it zoomed back out to it's original angle. "And, as Sandra mentioned, it also oxidizes at an impressive rate." The picture changed and small blue spheres began to float towards the large molecule to illustrate her point. With small flashes, they began to attach themselves to the whole.

  Ramirez gasped. Robert quickly turned around and ran to her side. She had her eyes closed and was struggling to keep a look of pain away from her face.

  "What is it? Honey, what is it?"

  She took in a quick breath and something tore. One of her thighs broke through the thinning stitches of her sweats and the toned muscle poked out from the lengthening hole. The other leg quickly followed suit and the stretched cotton snapped back from her tan skin. The tear slowly spread up to her crotch and the edge of a finely trimmed patch of fur peeked out; the dark and thin hairs contrasted nicely against the caramel colored flesh of her hips. Robert quickly covered her up with his leather jacket as her face began to turn red.

  "I'm sorry Doctor," she shrugged. "What can I say? I'm a growing girl."

  Vanessa just blinked, struggling to pull herself out of her torrid thoughts.

  "Where was I?"

  "You were explaining the quick oxidation rate of the molecule you've discovered."

  "Um, yeah," Vanessa shook her head, "normally this would eventually make the compound inert. But we found the molecule inside their cellular membranes working in tandem with the mitochondria.

  The screen shifted to show giant, pinkish blobs pulsating near the now shrunken molecule.

  "When the compound is fully saturated in oxygen, it triggers cellular mitosis."

  The blobs flashed and the molecule began to glow. After a few moments, the whole screen blurred and there were two sets of molecules and pinkish blobs; each set in their own translucent cell.

  "I'm not sure how, but this compound absorbs high levels of energy and uses it to synthesize another xenon nucleus; the two new compounds each have half the amount of oxygen as the original and then the cycle starts anew."

  "And that's why they are growing?"

  "Yeah," Vanessa looked at Krista and nodded. "Whenever they take in a breath, they gather the fuel this compound needs to make them grow. I'm assuming that their altered forms and accelerated sex drives are also gearing their bodies to that purpose. The more active they are, the more oxygen their bodies need and the deeper breaths they take."

  Ramirez took hold of her boyfriend's hand. Robert was amazed at the sheer size of it. He had always had long hands and fingers, but she had passed him up some time ago. She squeezed lightly and he smiled at her. She was beautiful and he didn't care how big she grew; he would always love her. Ramirez looked back to Vanessa.

  "Is there any way to stop this?"

  "I'm not sure of that yet," Vanessa turned off the main view screen. Sandra kept going over the smaller one in front of her. "When deprived of oxygen and ATP, the molecule does eventually break down."

  "That's not an option though; is it?"

  "No it's not Heather. And I'm afraid there is another problem." Vanessa scanned her audience. Gryphon wasn't paying much attention as he scratched at the floor between his legs. Heather had let her coat drop a few times and Vanessa had found herself sneaking a few peeks. The Captain was scratching at his small scar as he waited patiently. Krista was beautiful and Vanessa frowned before continuing.

  "The larger they grow and the more their bodies change, the more oxygen they are capable of metabolizing."

  "Which means they'll grow faster," Brian stated.

  "Correct. At some point I think the amount of oxygen they inhale and the level of xenon molecules that need to be maintained will eventually balance out and reach some equilibrium. How big they will be once they reach that point I can not say."

  "Could you take a guess?"

  "I'd say around two, maybe two hundred and fifty feet."

-    -     -

On to Page 5

-     -     -

Back to Necronomicon Index