Silicate SR-33

A multi-colored silicon mass sat at rest in a polymorphic form.

Everything it 'saw' was pitch black. Yet it could feel the walls which blocked its escape. It sensed living things with colored auras, the closest being an outline of a humanoid. Yet when it tried to reach it, the wall stopped it in its tracks. There was a they couldn't see, but could very well feel.

What was this?

The male humanoid on the other side of the wall, was decorated in a foul green aura.

An off-blue room, it stretched for twenty four meters in all directions. It was relatively cozy, barely furnished. The ceiling was adorned in two by one meter rectangular lighting emplacements every other meter in all directions. They gave an artificial hum, their lights bothering anyone who wasn't used to the white light.

In the center stood a single cylinder shaped containment unit made of what looked to be glass. It in reality was specialized steel which had been engineered to be transparent, transteel. A man stood beside it with an electronic clipboard, a datapad, in his hand.

"Data Entry one, August twentieth twenty ninety nine. The subject seems inactive. It's taken the shape of a mug adjacent to the containment unit. However it lacks the same texture and coloration. It still has the clumsy complexion of child's play putty." his voice was raspy and annoyed. His hair was grey, and he had a neatly trimmed beard which rested dangling about two inches from his chin. He seemed like a majestic old man, a scholar. Dressed in a scientists white coat with a simple ID hanging from his neck on a lanyard.

Little did this doctor know, was that the creature inside of the containment unit was staring back at him. It had no eyes, no ears. It had no visible exterior functions, but it could 'see' that he was male, had a pair of legs and a pair of arms. He was old, venerable. His body language, tone of voice and pheromones made him appear to be annoyed or angry.

However despite these mental observations, these were not the thoughts of the organism.

The organism within the containment unit was designated 'SR-33,' or Silicon Remnant 33. It was one of thirty-three silicon life forms plucked from a comet passing through the Sol Star System. It was the only surviving specimen after a series of tests to learn what made it survive in the vacuum, what it ate, how it communicates as it showed some form of intelligence during first contact.

Little did they know, was that these creatures were parasitic in nature. The more they devoured, consumed, and absorbed the more sentient they became. The reason behind there only being one last specimen left, was because it had eaten the others.

The creature bubbled, imitating the sound of gurgling in response to the doctor's observation log.

"Oh…? Interesting, it seems the creature is responding to verbal stimulation, it's imitating." He nudged the mug away from the cylinder and watched as the creature pressed itself against the transparent steel wall. Its mug like appearance being squished up against it. "Fascinating, SR-33 seems to be sentimental, attached to the shape."

The once annoyed doctor was completely astonished by the change of behavior. One of his colleagues, a female doctor, slipped in through the sliding door entrance. Immediately the docile behavior of the specimen changed.

It launched itself at the transteel barrier which separated the two doctors and the specimen. Smashing itself against the barrier at the female doctor's face level.

She stood there dumbfounded seeing the multi-colored silicon semi-solid sticking to the interior of the unit. She had brown hair, brown eyes and dark olive toned skin. Her hair was neck length and curly, a button nose and angular jaw.

The female scientist was different from the man, but the aura still felt foul despite its different hue. The only difference was, there was a light blue aura within her abdomen. A form of a partially developed human being outlined with the aura.

"Entry two… Specimen SR-33 seems aggressively attracted to Doctor Rem, so much as to launch itself at the barrier dividing us. Take note: This is the first time a female member of this exploration vessel has entered the room." The male doctor stated with an expression of curiosity.

Doctor Rem looked over at him, a brow raised and rather skeptical of his new entry. "You needed to point out the reason was that I was female, without any support?"

"We put male animals in the containment last week, and it ate them after a short period of ignoring them. Leaving only bones behind, clean hollow bones." He notified her with a frown on his lips as she seemed to scrutinize his observations with her expressions.

"What about female animals?" She asked curiously, raising a brow slightly.

The male clinched his jaw slightly. "It didn't eat them, and when we added a male, it immediately assaulted the male as soon as it came anywhere near the female."

Rem blinked a few times and looked at the doctor before turning her head to look at the specimen which was making the gurgling sound. Bubbles forming up against the barrier to project the sound.

"Is it trying to talk?" She asked curiously as she tilted her head to the side as she thought she heard something similar to a meow release from one of the bubbles. "…Did it just, meow?"

The male doctor simply blinked a few times and stared, nodding slowly. Since when could it mimic sounds? When he thought back, he remembered what kind of animals were placed in the cylinder with the specimen other than the other SR's.

Two cats, three rodents and a small dog. When this had happened the SR had the ability to develop fur and completely mimic the animals appearances. But as soon as it was given something else to mimic, he stopped using the guises.

"It could possibly be learning by consuming its prey," Rem said after a short duration of silence after looking over her own datapad which had information pertaining to the previous experiments.

Her eyes drifted over towards one of the nearby terminals which was in flux, lines going up and down, revealing cognitive thought which wasn't present in the previous experiment. She raised a brow slightly and looked towards the male doctor. "You should probably go have a look at that," she snickered quietly before stepping forward; having gotten closer to the containment unit.

"Of course," the old man snickered with a sneer, making his way over to the terminal which was displaying data on the subject. Looking it over, he raised a brow. All the bubbling, gurgling and mimicked sounds seemed to be giving a rhythm.

It was evident it was learning quickly, quicker than they ever would have thought. Not only had it been mimicking other sounds, but it was trying to communicate. It had high levels of cognitive thinking and was creating rhythms with its collection of 'voices.'

While the male doctor was distracted by the data which was scrolling down the screen, the specimen began to change in color. Its body began to change a naval blue, mocking the color of the woman's shirt.

Rem furrowed her thin, sharp, brows and stared at it as it began to spiral its way down the barrier wall. However it stopped mid-way down, at her abdomen.

She watched everything silently, its flat surface suddenly having what looked like a smile carving its way in its center. She immediately froze as the creature morphed into a mold of her occupied womb.

Gulping quietly, she dropped into a squat with anticipation as she observed each nook and cranny of the mold. It was indeed identical to the ultrasound she had, but much more clear which was intimidating. "How can you see that?"

The mold immediately changed into a question mark.

It was clear it had knowledge of the English writing system. She could only assume it had seen the writing on the datapads, on the mug and other sources which had been brought into the room.

The question was, how long ago did it learn?

Rem gave the other scientist a gander, before switching her attention back to the specimen. She raised one hand, holding her datapad in the other, as she pressed the free hand against the containment unit.

The specimen quickly morphed into a hand and mimicked her, pressing itself against the transteel with similar pressure. "Doctor Richmond, it's copying my hand," Doctor Rem reported which immediately made the other man turn and look over at them with a brow raised.

"That's a first. It's never mimicked a human shape, no matter how many times I got close to it." Walking over to the containment unit, Richmond would squat down to her level and flick the glass.

The specimen gave no response to the stimulation.

Frowning slightly, he lightly nudged Rem's hand away from the glass, but when he reached over to do so. Canine, feline and rodent teeth could be seen forming all over the creatures body. But when he took his hand away from his colleague, the teeth vanished, being absorbed into its mass.

"Oh…? Seems similar to the earlier experiments," Richmond observed with a sigh seeing as it was aggressive towards males as soon as they came towards a female. He still had no idea why it was like this.

"Were the female animilia pregnant?" Rem asked abruptly as she looked over at the old man who was stroking his chin in thought.

Blinking a few times, he looked back at the previous experiments and nodded. "They were all pregnant, or had been impregnated recently."

Rem nodded as she was coming up with a hypothesis. "So what if we had one that wasn't pregnant enter the containment unit?" She asked curiously as she looked over at him, a brow raised slightly.

Nodding slowly, he thought about the stock they had on board the science vessel they were currently presiding on. They'd be in space for the next several months on their way back to Earth's lunar base.

"We currently only have nonpregnant human subjects," Richmond was referring towards the human experimentations which were going on within the vessel. They weren't particularly legal, but there was no one stopping them from doing the experiments in the dead of space. What was worse however was the fact that they were young teens and children, kept in cages within the hold and hardly fed even rations.

These children were accelerated clones from a failed project on Mars in order to found a colony without sending actual explorers. The project failed when the observers and overseers perished during an outbreak of an unknown contagion, which was actually a coverup.

Richmond and crew had raided the mars outpost and killed everyone present and took the cloning technology as their own. They planned on using the children and teens generated from the cloning tech for their experiments without having to abduct or sign contracts for human experimentation.

Overall, their plans had worked well in their favor.

"I have the perfect one in mind, CC-3." Rem responded with a sinister grin across her lips.

SR-33 simply spiraled around against the glass like a drill, though couldn't do any damage to the glass-like material. It wasn't trying to escape though, it was confused about what was going on. That and it was hungry and primarily wanted something to eat.

"Heh, don't worry SR-33. You'll get a meal soon," Richmond mused and knocked on the transteel barrier before standing up and walking over to the door.

Rem followed after Richmond, holding her datapad close to her chest as they made their way out of the room. The specimen still had no idea what was going on. But when they left the room, it dropped to the ground and moved to the center of the containment unit.

Turning into what looked like the mug from before, the creature bubbled inside of itself, boiling water. Though in this case it just looked like a boiling mug made of latex. Was it talking to itself?