The briefing officer led them on a circuit through the virtual scene.
"Surveillance footage shows that after remaining intact for a period of time, these assembled limbs would catch fire and burn again—completely. Judging from the severely damaged scene and the recordings alone, we can't make out any obvious remnants."
As he spoke, the limb parts, clearly assembled according to certain rules and order, did indeed begin burning in groups. The groups did not ignite continuously, and the intervals between them varied. The flames also differed considerably in color, their interwoven light casting an especially eerie glow across the observers' faces.
Under that bizarre ambient light, someone asked hoarsely, "Are these severed limbs and organs confined to this site alone, or do they involve other areas as well?"
The briefing officer replied at once, "The surveillance coverage is incomplete, but we strongly suspect that a considerable portion of them was transported from other areas."
"Who transported them?"
"...It seems they came over by themselves."
The reconstructed virtual scene did indeed contain a large number of severed limbs and organs in "self-moving forms."
Everyone knew that most of them were already inactive tissue following dissection. Where, then, had that "autonomy" come from?
For a moment, everyone fell silent again.
Seeing that no one had any further questions for the moment, the briefing officer continued.
"Besides these corpse materials clearly intended for trade, the staff of the wandering space station also caught fire and burned in batches within a short period. The time gaps between individuals were even shorter than those among the 'trade materials,' roughly ten to twenty seconds from beginning to end... This is only a preliminary estimate based on the footage currently available.
"Some surveillance footage also shows that certain people reacted to the anomaly, but they clearly targeted