MFS-3 (Patreon)

If you both follow me this way," one of the technicians said a little while later. "We'll get this MRI over with so you can get some rest."

Sara nodded, and I helped her up from the bed. It was then, that I noticed the changes weren't just to her face. Her shoulders were a bit more hunched and she walked a bit unsteady on her feet.

"Is that due to the changes, or just getting used to gravity again?" I said.

She gave me a tired smile. "A bit of both, I'm afraid."

I held her hand and we followed the technician through the labyrinthine hallways. Emily was still wearing her flight suit, but they'd taken off her boots and she wore hospital slippers. Something was up with her feet, but I didn't want to examine any part of her too closely.

We got to the screening room, and Emily was taken behind a curtain. "You can wait back in her patient room, and we'll bring her back to you," the attendant said. I nodded, and gave my wife one more kiss. "I'll be waiting."

She smiled, nodding.

I went back to her room and found Captain David Patel, flight commander of the Stellaris, standing in her room and staring up at the health screen as it showed Emily's last vital signs.

"Dave?" I said. He gave a little jump. "Oh, sorry, I was hoping to catch Emily before they took her back."

"Just missed her." I shook his hand. "Congrats on the flight, man, that was amazing."

Dave was tall, about six foot three, with a dark complexion and a bald head. He'd been told he looked like Idris Elba, but I thought that was a stretch.

"Couldn't have done it without you here in Mission Control, John. You saved our asses more than once."

"They ever figure out that server glitch?" I said, sitting down in one of the chairs at Emily's bedside. During their orbit of Europa, one of the on board servers had decided to stop taking network commands. Luckily, it wasn't a critical one, just one of the scanning data collectors.

"No, that was the strangest thing."

I nodded. "It was like it wasn't even attached to the network at all."

He nodded, frowning. "Luckily, nav wasn't attached to that array."

I nodded and we both sat down.

"How's she doing?" Dave said.

I shrugged. "About how you'd expect having genetic anomaly, I guess."

He winced at that. "I'm sorry we couldn't tell you. It was top clearance only, we didn't want the word to get out."

I nodded. "No worries."

"Have they said... anything?"

I sighed. "The head brainiac said something about her genetic structure co-mingling with a troglodyte of something."

"Pan-troglodytes," David corrected.

"Yes."

"So it was Koko."

I shrugged. "Hard to say. Have any of the rest of you had any—"

He shook his head. "That was weird. Each day, she'd have some kind of 'fit' where she screamed a bit and when it was over her face—"

"How long has it been going on?"

"Just the last few days of the mission. We've been over and over telemetry and other data and just don't see anything that could have caused it."

"I'll pull the server logs, maybe they can shed some light on it," I said.

"Uh... might have trouble with that. Everything is embargoed."

"Damn, really? All mission data?"

"Yep, everything. Sealed up tighter than a gnat's eyeball stretched across a bass drum."

"That's tight," I said. Dave had a penchant for rather creative metaphors. He rubbed his head over his bald pate and sat down next to me. We both stared up at the data scrolling across Emily's screen.

There had been times when I thought Emily and Dave might be sharing a tryst. Emily had quashed those notions when we spoke, but I sensed Dave had deeper feelings than he let on.

"I suppose I should be going," Dave said. "I just wanted to see how she was doing."

"I'll let her know you stopped by."

Dave made no move to stand up, just stared off into the middle distance.

"You okay, man?"

"Yeah, it's just... weird, being back, you know? It's like... up there, everything is trying to kill you all the time. The air, the temperature, life support, the food, everything. Feels a little strange to just breathe out in the open now, ya know?"

I nodded. I'd heard similar stories from astronauts before.

"Take care of her, John." Dave spoke in a soft voice. "She's pretty special."

I nodded, knowing something actually had gone on during the flight, but whatever it was must be over now.

He gave me a strong handshake, a little too strong, and left.

A short time later, Emily shuffled in wearing a hospital gown. She looked exhausted, her transformed countenance bearing the weight of the trip.

"Everything go okay?"

She nodded, sitting on the bed, then levering her feet. She took off her slippers, rubbing her feet—

And I noticed they'd transformed also. The big toe on each foot had migrated apart from the rest of the toes.

She stared at them, wiggling her toes. "Guess I have monkey feet to go with my monkey face."

"Hey now," I said, taking her hand in mine. "None of that."

She nodded, and I could see tears slip down her face.

"Dinner!" an orderly came in, and set the tray down on Emily's bed table. Some type of mystery meat in gravy steamed next to a smattering of overcooked carrots and broccoli.

She wrinkled her nose at the smell and pushed it away.

"Is there something else you might like?" the woman said, her face falling at Emily's reaction.

"Do you have any fruit?" Emily said. "Or just a salad maybe?"

The woman smiled. "Let me see what I can find." She put the lid back on the tray and whisked it away.

I pulled a chair up to Emily's bedside and took her hand. She lay back on the pillows, closing her eyes. I watched as she dozed, her chest rising and falling a bit faster than I remembered.

She was home. Emily was home. It wasn't the homecoming I'd planned on, but it didn't matter—she was here, right here, and I was holding her hand. It seemed so surreal, during the long years, I'd had some quiet moments of desperation when I thought I'd never see her again.

I stroked her chin-length blond hair softly, so happy she was home, so happy she was safe—well, safe on Earth at least.

She made a soft noise, an "ook ook." I paused in my stroking.

It was the same noise Koko made when he was happy and content or being affectionate.

Emily opened her eyes. "What?"

"Nothing, honey." I smiled at her and resumed my stroking.

I fervently hoped Dr. Bennet found a way to reverse or at least stop this metamorphosis from happening soon.