Lain’s team jams spider communications, prompting debate over what the attackers are. Vitas insists they are programmed bioweapons and advocates planetary cleansing. Holsten counters that the intercepted signals are structured language, implying evolved sentience, but Lain prioritizes immediate survival over theory as drones are lost and hull sensors go dark.

On the exterior, spiders begin cutting at a shuttle-bay door. Karst assembles a heavily suited EVA squad to clear the hull. As they cycle the airlock, decompression blows several spiders away and the team guns down exposed attackers, whose armor resists but ultimately fails under sustained fire.

Even as Karst advances toward the shuttle bay, fresh alarms report new breaches across cargo and elsewhere. Interior comms erupt with screams; Lain tries to recall Karst, but he insists on neutralizing the hull nest first. Alpash hears an attack in his family’s quarters and abandons his post despite Lain’s order to stay.

At the shuttle bay, fewer spiders are visible, then webs spring the trap. Invisible threads entangle the squad as fast-moving spiders descend. Karst’s people are ensnared, some flung into space, others injected through suit gaps and killed. Communications chaos surges until Karst mutes channels, regains brief focus, and is then struck from behind as the ambush closes in.