The Crimson wake iii the stuff mares are made of.

The sleeping quarters in the lower quadrants were similar on this part of the way station. It was true that some had more rooms; Josie Macdonald, whose parents were Neo-Catholics, had double quarter’s as their family was so large. Something that the church itself subsidised, so she was told by Josie. But Josie was a bad liar too.
​       The bland grey green walls, lit by tiny yellow lights in the ceiling were designed specifically to create sight eye strain and in doing so, bring on sleep. The living space as in the other two bedrooms, contained a touch sensitive and voice activated wall screen. However it differed in one respect that on the left wall there was a seating area beyond which stood a kitchenette and a breakfast bar; that at that moment, was festooned with old food and unwashed utensils; because as she had told Da, on more than one occasion, she wasn’t going to clear up his mess and she wasn’t his slave.  Both bunk rooms had port windows that displayed the Way station.
​      They had been home an hour, Da had been called into work by Weasley to prepare his team to enter the Wake, and she, now off parental probation, had decided that enough was enough for one day and had settled for a night at home with the wall screen. 
​      She tried contacting Draz, but he had switched his screen off; she tried a few of her other people she spent time with on her block but gave up after half an hour as they seemed too preoccupied by the arrival of the Wake or busy with boyfriends and at the moment: both topics to her were irritating.  So she ate some cereal cross-legged on her bunk and then after casting the bowl aside fell flat upon her bunk
​       She closed her eyes, and instantly opened them again; the quarters were gone, and she was walking along a dark corridor.  It was as if she was walking in a cold water, shapes she couldn’t recognise floated about. Blurring her vision. She saw a light at the end of the hall, with her heart thumping in her chest she walked towards it and found it was a door the words “control” were scrawled over it in blood. Slowly, the doors curled  open and she found herself in a large round room. The room was blue tinted from a light source that came from the centre of the room.  Grav couches designed for FTL jump’s circled the room, equidistantly in front of which were dead consoles. in the centre of the room, upon the ceiling and    giving off a pale blue light, slowly undulated a bio server; glistening like wet leather.
​      Directly beneath the bio server stood a little boy.  Kit thought that he must have been about 10 or 11 years of age.  He was clothed in a navy one piece jump suit. His dark hair was combed flat to his scalp, his eyes were sunken into their sockets; yet they seemed to glitter at her with a light she found unnerving.
​      She slowly walked closer towards the boy who was whispering something that she couldn’t quite hear.  All around her, she sensed eyes boring into her. Eyes that wanted to harm her and hurt her. She fought against it. This is a dream this is a dream wake up wake up!  She screamed. Yet still she moved closer and closer to the boy; whose features slowly looked less youthful but chiselled with age
​     ‘I’m so cold…so cold…’ the boy whispered over and over again. ‘….so cold…help me…help me…
​    She stood face to face with him theur features glowed in the pale blue light.
​     ‘I’m so cold…so sold… help me…help me…’ he whispered again and agaun and again.
​     She saw her arm reach out to touch his face that suddenly began to change. The Jaw suddenly extended creating and enormous hole out of which thousands of gelatinous tendrils shot out to suffocate her
​     She woke with a scream and looked to the window.  There on the port window were the words help me written in blood
​     She screamed awake again.  This time, to the buzzing of the wall screen
​     ‘On.
​     Weasley’s face filled the room
​    ‘Hi, Kit, could you come up to Bio-server central…please ’

The trip in the turbo lift to the bio server room didn’t have the same sense of excitement that it used to have. Before, it had been about sticking a finger up at the Procter, now the rules had changed.  Besides the nightmare hadn’t left her fully. Then there was the lift itself. On the whole it would have at least ten to fifteen people in it, getting off at random floor’s going to their work stations or the mall’s for either rec or purchasing.  Today she was alone.  The news feed that ran in a line around the shoot informed her in a line of green light “that the major docking bay was off limits to all but security personnel; and that staff should consider that today was a holiday.” Yet nothing else was being said. Even the Zeta sets were playing re-runs This, she knew, meant trouble. The Wake must have something aboard.  As the floors raced by her, she desperately tried to get in touch with Da, but his phone was switched off.  The door suddenly swivelled open and she saw Weasley standing in front of her, wearing the same shirt has he had on the night before. It was clear that he hadn’t had sleep.  The room was hive of activity. With people gathered around monitor screens and talking into headsets.      
​      Weasley led her, through the crowd, towards  his empty office. at the far end of the room.  She hated it as it stank of stale onion sweat and was filled with half eaten dougnuts, half drank cups of hydrated coffee, skank and booze.
​      ‘Sit down…’ His face looked taught. Strained
​      ‘What’s wrong?’
​      ‘it’s your father…’ he gulped.
​      ‘What about my father?’ she could feel her voice quake.  Her legs trembled. 
​      Weasley looked down and away.  ‘he… went on the Wake.
​    ‘-and ?
​    ‘We lost his body signal.’