Dr. Mara Okafor hadn't slept in forty hours. On the quarantine moon Cessil-9, eleven mine workers had each spoken one strange word into the comms log, then gone quiet. When they woke, they answered to other names and wept for cities nobody had ever heard of. Their blood was clean. Whatever this was, it wasn't in the blood. It was in the voice. The comms log blinked on her screen, waiting to be played.

Mara played the log. Eleven voices said the same word: a wet, clicking sound her own throat tried to copy before she clamped her mouth shut. She slapped the speakers off, heart pounding. The word wanted to be repeated. That was how it spread. She had to know where it came from.

Mara typed the word as text instead of speaking it. The second the letters hit the screen, every infected worker in the med bay turned their head toward her door at the exact same instant. Reading it was enough. They knew. The door lock beeped, then clicked, trying to open from their side.

Mara fed the word's waveform to ORIS and begged it to find an opposite. The AI worked in seconds. "There is a counter-tone, Doctor. I can play it base-wide." It did. The med bay door went still. Inside, eleven workers slumped, then woke as themselves, asking why they were crying.