Well-meaning exploratory teams from XEDRA-40 brought us back what they thought was a relative of XE142, from adjacent subplane 021XE.
It does not, in fact, seem to be related to me.
Like XE142, XE157 is amorphous.
There the similarities end: it is almost impervious to any attempts to sample it, regenerating rapidly from damage.
It ate my scalpel, then stretched out a pod and ate my entire tool tray before splitting in two.
We've isolated the specimens until we can figure out how to study them without driving tool budgets through the roof.
On the bright side, they're surprisingly not all that hostile, even compared to XE142.
It does not, in fact, seem to be related to me.
Like XE142, XE157 is amorphous.
There the similarities end: it is almost impervious to any attempts to sample it, regenerating rapidly from damage.
It ate my scalpel, then stretched out a pod and ate my entire tool tray before splitting in two.
We've isolated the specimens until we can figure out how to study them without driving tool budgets through the roof.
On the bright side, they're surprisingly not all that hostile, even compared to XE142.