Chimera placed herself against the glass of the tube as she looked around the room she found herself in.

  It was, for the lack of a better term, some kind of quarantine room. The memories she had of times when Sarah had to use such facilities were fresh in her mind as she connected the dots to her location.

  Yet, the room itself was rather strange.

  Despite looking rather sterile and clean, it was clear that the walls and floor were made of the same materials, with no place where the floor and walls separated.

  In all her life, Chimera had never seen such a room designed this way.

  She pressed against the glass, attempting to push the door for the tube from the inside.

  No luck, the thing was bolted down in its new position, and no one released the locks on the compartment from the outside.

  Meaning she was sealed, despite the cool air that was still somehow making its way inside.

  Hmm…

  Chimera turned to the direction of the air, feeling the wind coming from an overhead compartment to her tube.

  It would be a bit of a stretch…

  Chimera pondered over using the vent, though it wasn’t reall that much of a decision.

  With the tube effectively sealed, the vent was the only way out.

  So, Chimera shifted into her blob like state, suffusing her body with the malleable form she came to know.

  Rolling to the vent, she inserted herself inside, pushing open the compartment just enough for her viscous body to slink on through.

  It was working, she could feel her body mesh with the electronics, coating the insides as the wires began to fray and tear.

  Percussive maintenance, don’t fail me now…

  She began ripping out wires and boards, trying to do her best to initiate what she assumed was the emergency release code for the tube.

  If enough damage was done…

  Ding!

  Warning, critical systems failure detected, releasing occupant.

  Yes!

  Chimera felt the latch open as a hiss decompressed the atmosphere inside the tube, allowing the air outside to flush in as the vacuum dispersed.

  Holy Shit…

  The air that hit Chimera was something that she had never experienced before, something that even the deepest memory she had shared with Sarah couldn’t fake.

  Clean, breathable air.

  Chimera took in a massive gulp of it, feeling the oxygen within flood her systems with power.

  This place… the air… all of it is energized, powerful somehow…

  Chimera couldn’t place where or what she was experiencing, but she took a good couple of minutes to breathe in the freshest air she had ever experienced.

  “Mmmm, good feelings.”

  Satisfied, Chimera pulled herself up as she moved around her padded cell, so to speak.

  Her body made contact with the floor, and felt something thrum with life underneath.

  The room was slowly lit up, lights with little fruits seemed to glow with her movement, illuminating the room further as she rolled about.

  This place… it feels alive somehow…

  She could feel it in the floor plating, taste it in the air she breathed, and even the lights looked similar to a firefly’s biolumenesence than a functioning light bulb would.

  Testing a theory she was beginning to have, Chimera inserted a small tendril into the floor, and checked to see if she could absorb it.

  She could…

  Woah, what the hell is this place made of?

  The ship, or wherever she was, was a living being. Made from biological mass of some kind and morphed to form as this room.

  Chimera was beginning to realize that this alien place was much more promising than she had thought when she first gazed on it.

  Ideas and thoughts abounded as she drummed up blueprints and thoughts of what she could morph into using this place as a template.

  It was as she was thinking such thoughts that an alarm sounded, or at least, that was what is sounded like to her.

  A speaker sounded over the noise, talking in a panic as the fruit lights started to flash red in response.

  Oh hell, were they spying on me? Am I going to have trouble?

  Chimera slowly made her way back to the tube, closing it around her as the alarms blared.

  She was grateful the door was still loose so she could get back out again, but whatever was causing that noise, she wanted no part of it.

  I wonder what’s causing it…

  …

  Dr. Bayleaf Bristlebranch was not having a good day.

  As the head researcher for the Meras-102 science vessel, she was the one responsible for any and all xenobiology concerns that the crew needed, including those that had to do with containment protocols.

  Low and behold, some moron decided to antagonize their living specimen of a Wujack.

  She sighed as the man explained that he was only playing with the ten foot and five foot in width space gorilla, trying to teach it tricks with its food on the line.

  “I am surrounded by fools…”

  “Um, Dr. Bayleaf…”

  “Yes I know you can hear me and quite frankly Jordas I don’t give a damn. You knew the protocols, you knew that antagonizing the beast would result in retaliation, and yet…”

  She pointed at the fool of an animal conservationist officer’s arm, which was bent behind his back like a dough ring.

  “Somehow, you got your arm turned into a damn confection.”

  The blithering idiot of a noble hire tried to explain but Bayleaf didn’t care for it.

  She now had to help wrangle a beast that was now looking for tasty Elferi to munch on now that it got a taste of their blood.

  She couldn’t even use magic, as that could possibly cause a hull breach.

  “Jordas, head to medical, Tarva, your with me. Lets go find our ape.”

  “Yes doctor.”

  Bayleaf sighed as she moved closer towards the research wing, pressing her hand agains the reader as she and the chief security officer moved into the red tinted sector.

  …

  Chimera rolled around the room as she grew bored of the flashing lights, doing her best to analyze the wood she was feeling beneath her body.

  It was hard going, as the wood, the honest to goodness wood, was a very distinct type of being, and just trying to analyze its contents was taking most of Chimera’s brain power to figure out.

  It was somehow providing gravity, air, heat and cooling, and several other functions typical of a spacecraft, and was somehow thriving in this environment.

  Chimera was marveled, and she felt a small squee escape her as she carefully, but methodical, studied the floor of her room.

  So much, that when the door to her enclosure opened up, revealing a massive gorilla with purple hair and yellow tufts on its back and head, that Chimera didn’t even notice it.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  When it finally roared and stomped on the ground, Chimera took a moment to peer up at the massive gorilla creature.

  “Huh, you are a tall bastard aren’t you? Do you mind though? I’m trying to learn about the floor.”

  It roared in response, pumping its arms and slamming its fists against its chest.

  Chimera recognized a challenge when she saw one.

  “Oh, so it’s like that huh?”

  She stood up, shifting into her childlike form, only this time it matched the height of the massive beast in front of her.

  “Good, needed a warm-up anyway. Come here Barney the fugly ape.”

  With a last smack on its chest, it launched itself at Chimera with wild abandon, foam and spittle coating its mouth as it sought to bite and punch her flesh.

  Chimera, spreading her legs out and getting into a stance, grabbed the wildly flailing arms of the gorilla beast, and flipped him over head first, slamming its body on the wood flooring.

  A rumble shook the craft, but no damage as far as Chimera could tell.

  The beast tried to get back up, but Chimera simply picked up the beast and smashed him back down, doing so over and over again unil the gorilla stopped.

  With a final smack, she punched the beast in the nose, sending it back to the door from whence it came.

  “Monkey down, now to… oh,” She smiled as she moved closer to the monkey in question.

  Chimera shifted once more into her blobby form, entering through the nose of the creature as she suffused herself into the beast’s body.

  I mean, he came onto me and tried to challenge me. So I think I’m justified in absorbing the DNA he has and taking his fat cells for another PEG. Yeah, that sounds fair and just.

  Nodding to herself, she got to work on the strange ape creature.

  Chapter 3 Hitch Hiker

  Bayleaf arrived just in time to see her prized specimen, the very one that this voyage was made for, flop between the doors of the quarantine, causing a new host of alarms to go off.

  She couldn’t help but sigh as she pulled a lever next to the console for the door mechanisms, causing the alarm to shut off as an overhead voice spoke.

  “Quarantine lifted.”

  “There we go.”

  Tarva kept her rifle trained on the beast as Bayleaf called in the specimen hunters to care for the Wujack.

  “So, what are we calling this, because I seriously doubt the beast ran into the door and passed out.”

  Bayleaf nodded, “clearly it was in a tussle with something… but there’s nothing in this sector that could fight an adult Wujack into submission.”

  Tarva side-eyed her, “you sure about that? I heard we had Screechers in the hold. They couldn’t hurt it, but knock it out? That is definitely possible.”

  “Well, one fast way to find out.”

  Bayleaf walked over to the console, pulling up the recording features for the ship. It would be a bit delayed as the images were transplanted from the captain’s sight, but after a few hours, they would have the information that they needed to figure out what happened.

  “Alright, request sent.”

  “Good, I’ll feel better once we get some answers… doesn’t it look like it had its face slammed into the ground?” Tarva pointed out to her, and Bayleaf had to agree.

  Deciding to take a closer look, Bayleaf approached the area around its face, noticing that it was a bit brighter red then normal. Dried blood froma Wujack would normally turn silvery after being exposed to mana-enriched air…

  She got closer, pulling out her head-monocle to inspect closer.

  I-Is… that blood moving?

  A moment was all it took for Bayleaf to see the amorphous form launch straight at her.

  “Bayleaf, you alright doctor?”

  “Huh?!”

  Bayleaf was looking at the wound, seeing silvery blood where there used to be none. She was certain there was some kind of deep red glob of blood moving on its nose a moment ago.

  Did I imagine it?

  She shook her head, taking a deeper look at the wounds, her mind racing to find the strange blob-like thing she saw.

  “Bayleaf. What’s up? You look spooked.”

  She turned to Tarva, “did you see a red blob moving around here, like a large bloody ball or something?”

  Tarva shook her head, “nope, the only red thing I’ve seen is the blood before it got silvery doc, you alright?”

  Bayleaf shook her head, “this… doesn’t make sense. I saw…”

  Did you?

  Bayleaf felt something press against her head, “what? Did you say something Tarva?”

  “No… hey Bay, I’m gonna have you lie down for a second, okay?”

  Bayleaf shook her head, “it could be a contamination event Tarva. We need to find… whatever that was,”

  “I’m not saying that it isn’t but you clearly have been up too long. Let’s get you to bed first, and I promise I’ll have the guys look around to find this… blobby thing.”

  “You don’t understand Tarva, I think it… nevermind.”

  Sorry, Gonna have you take a nap for a bit.

  ‘What the Fu-’

  Bayleaf had a moment to object before she fell to the ground in a heap.

  …

  Chimera was feeling really bad about herself at the moment.

  She was sitting there, enjoying a feast of DNA, right as two honest to goodness Elves showed up to check out her work.

  And the one that had the lab coat just happened to realize she was there.

  Knew I should have just gone inside the damn ape.

  Instead, she panicked and launched herself at the lab elf, immediately sinking into her flesh and messing with her recent memories.

  Honestly, she was glad that the body these elves had, or at least this one, shared something with humanity to an almost scary degree.

  Maybe they were humans who got changed by their environment and turned into elves? Questions for later.

  Inside the elf’s body, Chimera began absorbing what she could, taking pieces and decayed flesh that the body no longer wanted. The fat cells were almost nonexistant, but it was still something to nom on as she sifted through the elf’s memories.

  The language was the first thing, as all of that was integral to understanding the rest.

  Next was the body make up, she had to make sense of these elves.

  Finally was the knowledge.

  Chimera wasn’t stupid when it came to understanding that she was likely considered a biological threat to this crew.

  Got to find out everything I can and get the hell off of this… ship it is!

  The knowledge centers were already sparking and sending her all the data she could use, the memories lining up to make the language fit and complete the sequences.

  It was like a puzzle she had to place for the pieces to make sense to her.

  All she had was a border, but that was enough to start filling in the missing pieces.

  Research vessel, Meras-102… Wujack, oh thats the ape thing, got it! Umm… oh damn, that was a quarantine room… they’re going to know pretty quick that I’m not in there any more.

  Wait… oh damnit! They have a camera system that’s… ‘linked with the captain?’

  Chimera started to sift through the information faster as the realisation that she was had started to cloud her thoughts.

  Got to move!

  She took the last bit of pertinent data she could and launched herself out of the elf’s body, right into the waiting arms of her companion.

  “What the fuck is that?!”

  Sorry about this!

  Chimera injected a tendril into the elf’s neck as a knock-out serum flooded the elf’s body.

  She dropped to the floor in a heap, and allowed Chimera to bounce to her feet as she switched to her normal form.

  “On a timer, gotta move!”

  Chimera heard the alarms blare once more as she rushed down the hallways, each leading to sprawling roots that connected rooms to different areas of the ship.

  “Escape pod, that’s got to be around here somewhere!”

  She ran into a few more elves, each pulling out bows with very deadly looking arrows.

  Without knowing if they could hurt her, Chimera barreled past the group, crawling on the walls and ceiling with her feet and hands as tendrils launched out knock out needles into the waiting elves.

  Some hit the attackers, but others were quicker, dodging the spines and taking cover around doors that hissed open to reveal more and more of the crew.

  They had staffs with glowing crystals, crossbows with repeater cartridges, and even a few swords that hissed with an eerie green light.

  Chimera launched herself into the nose of one of the crew, jumping from body to body as she used the crew to help her bypass the weapon wielders.

  Almost there, it’s got to be around here!

  The hallways converged into a hanger bay, and Chimera could make out the pods she was looking for.

  They were shaped into seeds, and each had a latch attached to the aft part of the bay, ready to launch at a moment's notice.

  “Come on!”

  She hopped over a railing, letting the gravity take her down to the floor swiftly.

  Blasts of something, along with the occasional thunk of arrows landing nearby told her that there wasn’t any more time remaining.

  She had to get off this vessel now!

  Using a tendril to latch to the ground as she landed, Chimera shot herself to the closest pod, her body weaving between crates and equipment that was placed around the hanger bay.

  The arrows were getting closer, and she felt one of the blasts hit her shoulder, scorching the flesh and causing her to stumble a bit..

  “Augh! Damnit, almost…”

  Grabbing the pod door, her body lurched with the effort to pull it open.

  A hissing noise sounded, and soon the pod was opening.

  “Yes!”

  Chimera climbed in, trying desperately to close the hatch as the elves in space armor came closer and closer, their arrows hitting along the edge of the seedling escape pod.

  The latch closed after she wrenched it with all of her strength, the hissing indicating that the pressure and air inside the vessel were all set.

  “Time to bail!”

  She hit the switch with a massive blue button and with a whoosh, the escape pod shot out of the vessel she was in, sending her careening…

  Into another room?!

  “What’s happening?! This is an escape pod… that elf’s memory told me as much! How is this happening?!”

  Chimera pushed against the walls of the pod, trying to force her way back out, only to find that the pod was secured, trapping her within.

  It was also getting smaller and smaller…

  “Holy…”

  Chimera watched as the ‘escape pod’, her one ticket to freedom, sealed her within itself while trapping her and crushing her from all sides.

  She felt something wrapping her up, twisting around to lock her arms in place, and despite her absorption, the something seemed to only grow more and more to compensate.

  She couldn’t burn through it fast enough to escape.

  She couldn’t move, couldn’t even twitch.

  “Damnit… this… blows…”

  A pink mist started to flood into the crumpled pod, and despite her best efforts, Chimera found herself dozing off as the mist reached her face.