《Starbound and Broken》 Chapter 1: Mission Brief ARCHIVED MEMORY TRANSCRIPTIONS OF THE ORIGINAL CREW OF ECOLOGICAL SURVEY VESSEL No419. ORIGINAL OBJECTIVE: SURVEY EXOPLANETS AND DETERMINE LIKELIHOOD OF SUCCESSFUL SETTLEMENT AND/OR TERRAFORMING EFFORTS. AMENDED OBJECTIVE: INVESTIGATE THE POSSIBLE APPEARANCE OF PREVIOUSLY UNDETECTED SPACE CAPABLE SAPIENT RACE. [WARNING: THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS INFORMATION SENSITIVE TO THE TERRAN UNITED NATIONS AND THE GALACTIC FEDERATION AS A WHOLE, AND IS NOT TO BE VIEWED BY UNAUTHORIZED INDIVIDUALS]
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: MICHAEL HAYES SPEC: NAVIGATION
LOCATION: TUN-C11-4362 T-35 DAYS TO MISSION START
I walked through the endless corridors of our little research outpost, located squarely in a random crater, on an empty planet in the ass-crack of nowhere space, making the rounds to deliver the news to those in this section of the base. My first destination, of course, was the lab, not because it was closer than any other room, but because of who I knew was there. ¡°Hey there, whatcha doin¡¯?¡± I said as I entered and closed the door behind me. ¡°Just wrapping up, you?¡± replied Alice Lane, one of our team¡¯s xenobiologists, currently sitting in front of her desk, which held a small sample of this planetoid¡¯s soil. ¡°Nothing much, just looking at rocks, having the time of my life.¡± I said sarcastically, fully aware that her job involved looking at rocks to determine the viability of colonizing and/or terraforming worlds, and she loved every second of it. ¡°Oh really? And what did you learn?¡± she answered quickly, to which I immediately replied ¡°That there¡¯s an incredible woman sitting in front of some of them.¡± These sorts of conversations, where one false move or my dumb tongue would say something vaguely insulting before my brain could process it, and then make everything worse by attempting to backtrack, used to be fucking terrifying to me, but after living with these people for a few years, stuck in a cabin on a planet with no atmosphere where ¡®going outside to get some air¡¯ was more trouble than it was worth, you eventually learn to just go with the flow feeling safe in the knowledge that even if you do blurt out something stupid, no one will be offended by it. It was either that or hating each other¡¯s guts¡­ Anyway! ¡°I bet you say that to every other girl you see in here.¡± She said with a smile. ¡°Well yeah, otherwise they would be on my ass for not flying us out of this godforsaken rock¡± I said in an attempt to keep the humor going. ¡°Would you say that to the captain?¡± She asked, teasingly. ¡°Well first of all, there¡¯s no possible way that would ever end well for me¡± I said, answering her joke before turning serious. ¡°And besides, the captain I respect, but you I love, so she could never compare.¡± At this, she giggled. There it is, that is what I live for. That smile never fails to give me the warm fuzzies. ¡°Is that insubordination I hear?¡± Said Captain Chloe Paxton, her tone accusatory and not even remotely questioning despite her phrasing. Uuhhhh¡­ ¡°Uuhhhh¡­¡± I explained my thought process in that situation. The captain had a way of moving around without letting her footsteps make noise, so she tended to surprise everyone she ran into. When she had been confronted about it, she claimed it was an old habit that she couldn¡¯t easily break anymore, so we let it go, and eventually started making a game out of people¡¯s reactions to her jump scares. We all stared at each other in awkward silence for a second before chuckling, the women genuinely and me with fake embarrassment, before she delivered the news I had intended to give before getting distracted. ¡°Data packet just arrived from HQ; we¡¯ve got a new mission on another planet so everyone needs to be in the briefing room in fifteen. Before that, though, Alex wants his ass kicked, so if you have time to spare, you might as well come watch the show.¡± The captain explained quickly before excusing herself. ¡°Well, you heard the boss, time to move, we have at least five minutes to finish everything up if we want to be there in fifteen.¡± I stated, to which she gave me a small frown and replied with ¡°She said she was going to fight Alex first.¡± At that, I couldn¡¯t help but smile and say ¡°Correct, and my statement is untrue because¡­¡± I left the question open, letting her arrive at the only possible answer, which she quickly did, and snorted. ¡°Ok, fair, just help me pack this up.¡±
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALEXANDER BELMONT SPEC: GUNNER
LOCATION: TUN-C11-4362 T-35 DAYS TO MISSION START
Today is the day! Today is the day I finally beat her and take the title of captain for myself! Or something like that, I dunno how chain of command works. Laughing at the silliness of my own internal monologue, I walked into what everyone else had taken to calling the toolshed. It was a place I could barely fit in, with its many stacked shelves reaching close to the ceiling leaving little space unused in any direction. Despite the unwelcoming dimensions, this was a place I visited often, especially before important events, to ensure my left arm was still operating optimally. I¡¯d had it replaced with a metallic prosthetic some time after losing it, and luckily for me, I have the best mechanic on this side of the galaxy. ¡°Hey Fae!¡± I called out. ¡°Are we going to the gym or are you planning to flutter over there by yourself?¡± ¡°Coming!¡± She replied, poking her head out from one of the shelves high up off the ground. The woman, small even when compared to everyone else here, had taken advantage of this planet¡¯s low gravity by outfitting her workshop like a climbing gym, with each shelf acting as a different workstation reachable by climbing or jumping, and of course each was carefully reinforced to be able to take the force of doing this without damaging itself or whatever happened to be on it. With practiced ease, she lowered herself from her position with seemingly reckless leaps before carefully lowering herself to the usual spot atop my shoulders. This whole setup might have looked like a disaster waiting to happen, but with the reinforced surfaces and this planet only being an uninhabitable ¡®Class 11 Deathworld¡¯ due to its lack of an atmosphere, it was actually relatively safe. Provided nobody did anything too stupid. ¡°How are you feeling, big man?¡± She asked from her perch behind my head. ¡°Honestly? Kinda nervous. Think maybe you could take a look at my arm again before the match?¡± I asked, forgetting my previous attempts to distract myself in this moment of sincerity. ¡°I did that two hours ago, it¡¯ll be fine. Unless, of course, you wanted something new, like, say¡­ a railgun?¡± She tried to tempt me with the tantalizing offer of installing a heavy-duty weapon capable of piercing a battlecruiser¡¯s armor at the literal tip of my fingers. Dating a mechanic who likes to tinker with prosthetics has some additional benefits, after all. As long as you don¡¯t mind occasionally finding out you got more than you asked for, but if you ask me, that¡¯s part of the fun! ¡°Wouldn¡¯t that blow my arm right off after the first shot?¡± I asked, ignoring the many other ways firing that thing in here could easily kill us all. ¡°You want to shoot a person¡­ with a railgun¡­ TWICE?¡± She asked incredulously, and there was only one possible answer to that question, really. ¡°Well, if the first shot doesn¡¯t work, then yeah.¡± She let out a genuine laugh at that and ushered me to take us to the gym, where the pipsqueak and I had set up a little arena for our sparring matches and whenever we decided to challenge the captain.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: TUN-C11-4362 T-35 DAYS TO MISSION START
I waited, facing the ring where the captain already stood, with Curt by my side. The anxiousness he felt was apparent in the way he stood ramrod straight with his fists slightly clenched, and I knew why he felt like that, he¡¯d told me just earlier. ¡®He¡¯s either gonna break our losing streak, or have his ass handed to him spectacularly. Either way, it¡¯s gonna be a fight to remember¡¯ he¡¯d said. In truth, what he was feeling was a combination of anxiousness that his friend would be the first to eke out a win, and anticipation to seeing said friend do something stupid he could use as teasing material. ¡°Think he chickened out?¡± I asked, trying to strike up conversation to distract him from his intense staring contest with the door.If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. ¡°No, he¡¯ll be here.¡± He said, and was almost interrupted by the sound of the door opening to the tune of that classic song from that timey centuries¡¯ old movie about the rock that became a boxer. With that as background music, in walked Alex, an utter behemoth of a man that dwarfed everyone else at this base, strutting like he owned the entire place in a display that might have been intimidating, had it not been for the comparatively tiny woman sitting on his shoulders, whooping, cheering, and generally being as obnoxious as possible, utterly draining the scene of any faux gravitas it might have otherwise had. ¡°You guys made it! How¡¯re you feeling?¡± I asked the both of them, and it was Fae who answered. ¡°We did, and he¡¯s ready to kick some ass! He even has a strategy and everything.¡± She said, after having pressed a button on her ride¡¯s robotic shoulder which caused the music to stop abruptly. She then used the larger man¡¯s inorganic arm as a handhold to aid her in the process of climbing down. The size difference was almost comical between the two, with Alex being Alex and Fae being even shorter than Curt. ¡°You know I can hear you from here! Any low blows and I¡¯m not just beating you black and blue, you¡¯ll also be going home for good!¡± The captain chose that moment to interject in the conversation from her spot on the other side of the large room, drawing a laugh from the four of us. ¡°I¡¯m rooting for you, you know? Just don¡¯t go at her too hard or you¡¯ll blow a fuse.¡± Curt said somewhat sincerely, but of course he couldn¡¯t help himself and had to add a tease at the end. ¡°Heh, shove it pipsqueak, just watch me.¡± Alex said confidently as he walked into the ring. He¡¯s gonna pay for that one later. There¡¯s only two people in the universe that Curt allows to call him ¡°pipsqueak¡±, one being me and the other Alex, and the latter only with the knowledge that Curt will always give as much as he takes in any fight, whether it be a real one or a joke. When the two fighters entered the ring, the atmosphere suddenly turned serious, neither saying a word as they eyed each other, unarmed, and settled into their stances. There was a clear contrast between the two as they stared each other down. Where Alex was a hulking mountain of a man, whose entire figure spoke of the power he could bring to bear, captain Chloe was the epitome of function over form. Lacking clear excess in any regard, she might appear unimpressive at first glance, but a closer inspection revealed unmatched expertise in her stance, and a toned physique with a dense layer of muscle clinging tightly to her form, making her one size larger in volume than one would assume by just looking at her average height. Curt walked up and took the role of announcer, which in this case meant little more than signaling for the fight to start. ¡°You may begin when this coin touches the ground.¡± He said, producing a metallic coin and tossing it into the air. PING! Immediately upon hearing the coin drop, Alex dashed forward with a big, right-handed swing headed straight for his opponent. Despite initial appearances, there was some nuance to his tactic, for this big obvious swing was, in fact, a feint. As such, he stepped onto the accompanying right foot rather than pushing off it for maximum power, which would leave him in a decent position for a follow up. Of course, this strategy hinged on his opponent not reacting fast enough to notice this, but Chloe did, pivoting to the side and delivering a devastating kick to the back of the now load bearing right knee, which quickly sent him tumbling down to the ground. From there, she moved up behind him and put his neck in a stranglehold, and much as the larger man tried to dislodge her, his own oversized frame got in his way, making it impossible for him to reach his attacker, and he quickly was forced to tap out, surrendering in the process. ¡°Well, that certainly went¡­¡± said Fae, after making sure he was alright. Of course, remembering the earlier name-calling, Curt chose that moment to interject and rub salt on the man¡¯s bruised ego. ¡°Nah, it was good! You should be proud, you even managed to beat my record!¡± He said enthusiastically, drawing a confused look from the exhausted, panting fighter. ¡°Really?¡± He asked between breaths and quickly received a reply. ¡°Yup! You are now the proud holder of the record for the fastest defeat by the captain! Congrats! I even made a small sticky tag to remember this occasion.¡± He said, and slapped the tired giant¡¯s back between the shoulder blades. Alex, quickly forgetting about his tiredness, sputtered confusedly before getting up, muttering ¡°What the¡­ You little shit!¡± as he reached for the small tag stuck to his back. In the process, he revealed that there was no such tag there¡­ Not that he would ever find out, since he couldn¡¯t reach its supposed location. Realizing this, he gave up on it and instead opted to take his fake anger out on Curt, who deftly avoided his grabs at every turn. I walked up to Fae and just settled beside her, both of us enjoying the spectacle of our partners acting like goofy morons with no words needing to be exchanged. Of course, like with all good things, someone eventually had to ruin them, in this case that being Billy Carter, who had apparently been lurking around this scene for some time now. ¡°Y¡¯all are adorable, but you do know we actually have shit to do today, right? So get your asses to the briefing room yesterday.¡± Everybody groaned, but had to admit that he was right.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: TUN-C11-4362 T-35 DAYS TO MISSION START
As the last people filed into the briefing room, it was all I could do to hide my emotions, and the earlier fight certainly wasn¡¯t helping. On the one hand, I was as glad as everyone else to be leaving this desert rock and going somewhere with literally any living things other than the people we live with. On the other, the abridged notes I was given to prepare myself to break the news were somewhat bleak. Ah, whatever, it¡¯s only a Class 7, we should be fine. The Galactic Federation had a ranking system for every registered planet they encountered based on how likely any random lifeform pulled from anywhere in the galaxy was to survive and/or thrive if dropped onto that planet, with a particular focus on sentient lifeforms for obvious reasons. Classes 1-5 were called ¡®gardenworlds¡¯ and were those were you could generally expect most, if not all living things, practically regardless of their origin, to do just fine unassisted. Classes 6-10 were called ¡®roughworlds¡¯ and were those where most beings could live with the help of protective equipment and a relatively select few could stay unassisted for long periods of time. Anything above Class 10 was called a ¡®deathworld¡¯ and the Feddies didn¡¯t want anything to do with them. Somehow, Earth had ended up being labeled as one of these deathworlds because it had what the GF considered ¡®exceedingly strong gravity¡¯ and ¡®extremely hostile native flora and fauna¡¯. With how ridiculous that sounded, we just tended to label anything below Class 10 a gardenworld and call it a day, much to the annoyance of Federation members everywhere. When everyone was settled, I began explaining the mission parameters, both the bits and pieces I had already read through and the details that I would mostly be finding out along with the crew. ¡°Alright people, as you¡¯ve heard, we will be leaving this rock by the end of the day.¡± I had to pause for a second to allow the more riled up crew members to do a quick cheer, but a glare quickly sent a message that I no longer had to say aloud: ¡®This is serious time, and it will be treated as such.¡¯ When everyone was quiet, I continued. ¡°This new mission will be taking us to investigate GF-C7-89573, a gardenworld owned collectively by the Galactic Federation, home to an indigenous species that look like what you would get if you stacked a slug on top of a pillbug, which is why the eggheads back home have taken to calling them¡­¡± At this I had to stop, do a double take, and sigh ¡°¡­pillslugs.¡± I had no choice but to allow the faint giggles and chuckles that emanated from the dozen people seated in front of me, my own reaction not having been dissimilar. It was when I caught Sarah¡¯s whispered ¡°Well, that¡¯s an image¡­¡± that I had to put a stop to the antics before the briefing could be derailed any further. ¡°As far as we¡¯ve been able to tell, these creatures are eusocial, and communicate by sending electrical signals through the slime they coat their dens with. They have poor senses, but are always surrounded by a number of Guardians, each possessing wildly different traits to each other and are highly aggressive and dangerous, to be treated as though they originated from a world several classes higher. Now¡­¡± I said, finally getting to the meat of the infodump ¡°¡­What¡¯s really strange about these beings and the reason why we are even bothering to investigate them in the first place, is that this species, previously thought to be non-sapient, have ¨Cseemingly overnight and unaided¨C launched a tree into orbit.¡± You could hear a pin drop in the room as everyone processed that information and reached the same conclusion: Foul play was afoot. Someone was trying to exploit these creatures in some way and doing a poor job of hiding it, meaning they were either really confident or really stupid. ¡°As you can imagine, the GF wanted someone to investigate, and as Class 12 deathworlders,¡± When I finished saying that word, I was interrupted, something that rarely happens, by William Carter, who felt the need to loudly exclaim ¡°You mean Galactic badasses¡­¡± He trailed off in shame before he could finish that comment, so I continued with the brief. ¡°¡­The GF determined that we would be the most suitable to safely look into this development. Be aware, though, that they did this reluctantly, after having sent their own teams, which all failed to report back.¡± Once again, silence, you could practically hear the gears in everybody¡¯s head turning in unison, as of the two previous hypotheses, that whoever¡¯s doing this is either confident or stupid, the latter was immediately wiped out by how competently they had prevented outside powers from meddling in their affairs after being found out, and now the situation clearly didn¡¯t add up. While everyone brainstormed, I, who had already been privy to this bit of information, was making other calculations in my head, namely, who I¡¯d be taking with me to investigate and who would be left behind to man the mothership and rescue us in case of an emergency. I¡¯m definitely going to need a chemist, xenobiologist, and scout, and some heavy weapons would be nice, given the state of the previous groups dispatched to investigate. Alex is unmatched in that regard, and if I don¡¯t want to mix squads, then my sub-captain should be Curt, who is also a scout specialist. Besides, I don¡¯t want William possibly in charge of first contact after that comment, so I guess it¡¯s settled. It turns out that when you stick 13 people in a tiny house and seriously limit the amount of time they can spend outside, you either get a new found family or multiple murders, and very rarely something in between. This case had been one of the rare exceptions, since while everybody tried to make it work as best they could, in the end, two different groups were formed, each tightly knit with several platonic and romantic relationships within them, but also constantly rubbing the other group the wrong way, which led to them avoiding each other as a sort of professional courtesy, with me being the only one able to freely interact with both. Silencing the murmurs going around about the new information, I went on to finish the briefing. ¡°Alright, we will be anchoring to and infiltrating the tree in orbit with a docking pod. I want Curt, Alex and Alice with me when we get in. Per standard protocol, I¡¯ll also be taking a chemist, engineer and navigator with me. You are free to fill these positions as you see fit, but I¡¯m guessing¡­¡± ¡° ¡° SQUAD LOVEBIRDS-1 READY FOR ACTION ¡° ¡° Half the assembled people cheered, while the remaining half could only groan in frustration at having to spend more time locked up while everyone else got to have fun possibly making first contact with secretive beings that may or may not be hostile. ¡°Alright, that is all, remember that standard protocol is that we are to record our memories with the transcriber, and log them should anything go wrong. Any questions?¡± ¡°Ugh, that thing always gives me a headache.¡± Alex groaned, to which Curt responded without missing a beat ¡°Well, that¡¯s because it needs an actual brain to work, or are you afraid we¡¯re gonna find out you are juicing?¡± At that, with an evil glint in his eye, Alex coldly responded ¡°Well, there¡¯s that, but there¡¯s also a bunch of other things I¡¯ve done that I specifically want to be there to see your face when you find out.¡± NOPE. Nonono, Not touching that, this briefing is now over. ¡°Alright!¡± I interrupted before we were all cursed with forbidden knowledge. ¡°If that is all, you are dismissed! Navigators, plot a course to our destination!¡± Chapter 2: My Space Treehouse
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: FAE MALLORY SPEC: ENGINEER
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T-5 MINUTES TO MISSION START
FLAGGED FOR (1 MINOR) COUNT OF IRRESPONSIBLE BEHAVIOUR DURING A MISSION
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
The insertion pod that all seven of us were stuffed into was a cramped affair, a far cry from the proper shuttle we would be using on our return trip to the mothership. But, needs must, and this thing had a much smaller footprint, and was therefore less likely to be spotted on approach, which was important with there being nobody in the floating space tree that could make sure there were no hostiles waiting at our entry point or that we wouldn¡¯t be shot at before even getting the chance to begin our mission. In space, the main limiting factor to the distance one could cover was the amount of fuel one was willing to stuff into their design, and given that, before being used, any fuel taken had to be carried around, increasing the mass of a ship and paradoxically limiting the distance one could even cover, in practice this followed one of two trends: You either packed just enough fuel for your needs and made do, like in the case of the pod we were in; or you brought what always feels like an outrageous amount of fuel that somehow never ends up being enough, like in the shuttle we would be taking to get back to our mothership once our mission was done. And then there was the mothership itself, a kilometer long mega-structure whose sheer size made it impractical to even attempt to move without using the FTL technology that allowed it to hop between star systems¡­ with the side effect of vaporizing everything within a thousand kilometers when coming out of warp, hence the need for shuttles and pods when moving within the orbit of a planet or moon. Then, of course, there was the fact that this pod being smaller would make it harder to spot, and a smaller target in case something decided to take pot-shots at us, which I was actively trying not to think about. To be fair, the chances of getting shot at seemed fairly low, given that we were flying towards a literal tree. And it was actually a tree, that fact had cost me 20 creds in a bet against Mike, with its trailing roots, hard bark and somehow even a lush canopy, it had a size that dwarfed even the mothership we were rapidly distancing ourselves from. How they even managed to get something like that off-world, with its unwieldy shape and the planet below¡¯s thick yellow atmosphere was a mystery to me, second only to why anyone would even bother in the first place. ¡°Are we sure this dinghy has enough fuel to get us there? Or are we gonna have to chuck the one that¡¯s clearly weighing us down?¡± Asked Curt, putting an end to any and all serious introspection. ¡°Don¡¯t look at me, you are the most throwable person in here.¡± Replied Alex, wrapping an arm around the smaller man¡¯s shoulder and earning a light jab to the kidney for his trouble. Lighthearted antics ensued for a few minutes as all of us, with the exception of Mike who was flying this thing, took a moment to de-stress from being in the most vulnerable position we would be on this entire mission, completely unarmed and moving slowly to avoid detection. The pod was capable of impressive acceleration, but only for short periods due to its scant fuel reserves, and even then, those maneuvers meant pulling an unhealthy amount of Gs¡¯. ¡°Approaching our contact point¡± Informed Mike, pulling us all out of our revelry and back into serious mode. Shortly after, with a light shaking, our pod made contact and dug through the bark of the space tree, offering us a way inside. Alex was the first one out, followed by Curt and then the captain, and only once we¡¯d been given a signal did Alice, Mike, Sarah and I follow them. The trio that left the pod first did a thorough check of our surroundings while we hung back, ready to move in whatever direction was required of us. Curt examined our surroundings equipped with a rifle nearly as big as he was, along with a handgun that could be quickly drawn from its holster, while the captain had a handgun in one hand and one of her ridiculously tough, sharp tipped polymer sticks on the other, the remaining stick secured to her back. Meanwhile Alex had his left arm in its gatling gun configuration, because, and I quote: ¡®what¡¯s the point of having a robot arm if it can¡¯t turn into a huge fuck-off gun?¡¯. ¡°Clear!¡± Curt announced, drawing a collective sigh of relief from the rest of us that that asshole Carter hadn¡¯t picked an insertion point that would send us directly to our deaths. The inside of the tree was nothing like how I had expected, but a lot like how Alice had told me it would be, which means I just lost another bet. Those two had better buy the rest of us some snacks or something with the amount of money they¡¯ve been getting around this whole fiasco. Anyway, where the exterior resembled the hard bark one would expect from a tree anywhere near this size, the interior was¡­ gross. The tunnels we found ourselves in were completely covered in gunk from floor to ceiling, and they weren¡¯t completely dark but I almost would have preferred it, with spots that emitted yellow lighting distributed randomly throughout the floors, walls and ceilings, that cast everything else in a sickly light that made the slime coating everything look like vomit. At least the atmosphere was breathable, as one would expect from a Class 7 world, or a ¡®vessel¡¯ originating from one, for that matter, and the smell wasn¡¯t as bad as its visual presentation would lead one to believe. That being, not offensively or painfully horrible. Although perhaps the strangest thing happening was one that I almost took for granted: These things had gotten artificial gravity working on a space tree, which while not all that impressive by itself, made it clear that some outside force was at play here. I crouched down to do a quick inspection of the slime that appeared to coat literally everything in our surroundings, while thanking whoever it was back home that had made it standard protocol to pack tents when going on expeditions uninvited, instead of roughing it wherever you ended up. ¡°Hey Sarah, come take a look at this.¡± I said, seeking the expertise of our group¡¯s chemist. The bit of mucus I had scraped up with my gloved fingers was actually translucent, with the green color coming from the walls and floor behind it. ¡°Looks like snot.¡± Was her brilliant insight. ¡°I can already see the Nobel that¡¯s waiting for you for that.¡± Said Curt, clearly agreeing with me, and drawing an evil look from his girlfriend¡¯s face. ¡°Oh yeah? Well, it does look a lot like the snot you have on your nose.¡± She said, taking the bit of slime from my hand and throwing it at his face. He managed to dodge, but was almost thrown off balance and barely managed to avoid face planting in the very thing he had tried to avoid. ¡°Careful there, you wouldn¡¯t want to end up covered in goop. Then again, it just might be an improvement.¡± Said Alex, sensing an opportunity and pouncing on it, which, of course, Curt wouldn¡¯t fail to reciprocate. ¡°Well, the bigger they are¡­¡± He said, following the uninspired half one liner with a kick to the back of the other man¡¯s foot near the Achilles¡¯ heel, causing him to go tumbling down and only managing to stop himself with his organic hand. ¡°Woah dude! Not cool.¡± He said, shaking and trying to clean up his hand. ¡°I dunno man, wouldn¡¯t want to see you two end up wrestling in here and getting all oiled up.¡± Coyly suggested Sarah, drawing horrified looks from the wrestlers in question. ¡° ¡° Gross. ¡° ¡° They both said, wrongly, at the same time. Ok, maybe they weren¡¯t wrong but that is now one of the things I¡¯ve ever imagined. In fact, it would look something like¡­ [Technician¡¯s note: Nobody wants to see this. How did she even do this? These are supposed to be text format only, gave the machine a stroke.]The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. Hehe. The fact that someone might have to read these at some point gives me endless amounts of joy. Hey you! Yeah, you reading this! Whenever you find this, give me a call, I¡¯ll buy you a beer! [Technician¡¯s note: No thanks.] ¡°Alright, children! Put your grown-up pants on! It¡¯s time to move! Mike, Alice, conceal the hatch so we can go find a spot to camp. Science crew, hold off on doing any more sciences until we have an area secure. Move out!¡± Ordered the captain, putting an end to our shenanigans and shifting everyone back to serious mode. We all got moving in loose formation once Mike and Alice were done hiding the entry to our pod so it wouldn¡¯t arouse suspicion from anything passing by, the metal hatch not exactly blending in with the surrounding goop covered walls. This had the advantage of us being able to use the pod as a fallback position, should we need to hide behind its bulletproof hatch, but it did have two big disadvantages. The first being that it would technically be leaving a big, conspicuous metal wart on the outside of the space tree, although, to be fair, the many orders of magnitude difference in their respective sizes would make spotting it pretty hard. The other drawback was that the pod didn¡¯t actually have enough fuel to get us back to the mothership due to its size constraints, so we would have to keep the rescue team on speed dial, since locking ourselves in there would also mean we would be stuck there until they could come pick us up. Asshats though they were, the 6 left behind at the mothership would let nothing stop them from putting together a rescue op the second they stopped receiving a signal from us. The formation we settled in had Curt, our scout, taking point at the front, followed by the captain, and then Mike, Alice, Sarah and myself clustered in the middle as part of the science crew, with Alex, the only person equipped with rearview mirrors, taking up the back of it. As we trudged on through the goop covered tunnels, I eventually had enough and decided to deploy my secret weapon. ¡°Hey Alex, mind giving me a ride?¡± I asked, already knowing the answer, having asked a million times before. ¡°Sure,¡± he responded ¡°as long as you don¡¯t mind getting dumped on your ass if anything comes up.¡± He gave me the ¡®professionally responsible¡¯ version of the answer, which was right of him, but come on! Like anything¡¯s gonna happen. I pressed a hidden button on his left arm that caused it to bend 90 degrees at the elbow and turn into a gyro stabilized seat that I climbed onto after turning my backpack to sit on my lap, giving me a smooth, goop free ride through the gross, sticky tunnels. Everyone gave me looks of what I will always choose to interpret as jealousy, but nobody called me out on my taking advantage of my particular situation, so, sucks to be them. As long as I¡¯m sitting here, I might as well check up on The Project, just gotta make sure I do it discreetly. Oops, probably shouldn¡¯t let that get into the log, don¡¯t want to ruin the surprise. N???o???w??? ???t???o??? ???g???e???t??? ???i???n???t???o??? ???t???h???e??? ???r???i???g???h???t??? ???s???t???a???t???e??? ???o???f??? ???m???i???n???d???.???.???.??? [DATA CORRUPTED] ¡­And with that, just have one more button to push and¡­ I watched as the cupholder deployed itself from Alex¡¯s arm and used it to hold the drink I had pulled up.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALICE LANE SPEC: XENOBIOLOGIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+2.5 HOURS TO MISSION START
¡°This looks like a decent spot to camp.¡± Announced Curt, fucking finally. My legs had started to hurt from getting stuck in the muck some time ago, and the sight of Fae getting her munchies like this was just a normal Tuesday, while at first had been so jarring it looped back around to being funny, was not helping at this point. And then there was also what had been making me anxious this whole trip. ¡°Any signals or communications from the locals?¡± Asked Captain Chloe, and that was it, it wasn¡¯t that anything was happening, it was that what I had expected wasn¡¯t happening. ¡°Nothing yet.¡± I answered with a worried tone. It wasn¡¯t that we hadn¡¯t seen anything, we had watched several of the pillslugs from afar, going about their business in organized trails that sometimes intersected with each other but never collided. We had even hidden from numerous Guardians, and not even once did we catch a whiff of them talking to each other, with no electrical signals being fired. Are they being mind controlled or something? Why aren¡¯t they talking to each other? There¡¯s no way they can coordinate without some form of communication. Maybe our equipment isn¡¯t sensitive enough, although I¡¯m pretty sure I calibrated it¡­ It had almost got to the point where I started to wonder if our intel had been wrong, or if they were being blocked by the pervasive slime that covered everything, but it hadn¡¯t been time to test that theory. What was working in our favor, however, was that unlike the pillslugs, the Guardians always walked on two, four or six legs, making them easy to notice well before being spotted by keeping an ear out for footsteps other than our own. Less in our favor was just how intimidating those creatures were, their surprisingly large bodies rippling with the kind of tightly packed muscle you wouldn¡¯t expect to see on a gardenworld, but then again, that also made everyone take staying out of their sight seriously, so it might just balance itself out. ¡°Alright, then, Mike, Curt, Alex and I will secure a perimeter and get to work on pitching our tents, the rest of the science crew, if you don¡¯t have anything you need to get done right now, help out with the tents.¡± Commanded the captain, and that had been what I was waiting for. ¡°Fae, Sarah, help me out with an experiment?¡± I called out before they could go off and do whatever was on their minds. ¡°Sure! Whatcha¡¯ thinkin¡¯?¡± Asked Fae, walking up with a skip in her step that I just could not empathize with. ¡°I¡¯m gonna need an insulated surface, electrodes, and a bit of slime¡­¡± I said, and all three of us got to work. ¡­ ¡°That¡¯s amazing!¡± ¡°This doesn¡¯t look good¡­¡± Said Sarah and I, respectively, having had wildly different reactions to the results of our little experiment. When prompted, she elaborated. ¡°This conducts electricity in its own, unique way! Send out a quick pulse and it goes through, no problem, send a continuous current, and it gets stopped completely! Just think about what we could do back home with a semi-conductor like this! It¡¯s almost like a non-Newtonian fluid, slap it and it turns solid, move it carefully and it stays liquid, except instead of changing its state, this changes its conductivity!¡± She explained with unmasked excitement, and, to be fair, I couldn¡¯t blame her. As the group¡¯s chemist, she was the first to catch that, followed quickly by Fae when she started her explanation. For the sake of redundancy, everyone in the group had at least a basic idea of how to do the tasks everyone else had been assigned, but we each had our own specialization. For example, while any of us was technically capable of flying a ship or keeping track of where we¡¯d been, Mike, as our Navigator, was the only one who could reliably dock his ship with another in space on his first try, or get out of a maze by following a paper map. So, once she told me her thought process, the possibilities did cheer me up somewhat, but they ultimately did nothing to calm my anxiety, because they had missed the point entirely. ¡°So, what¡¯s eating you up?¡± Asked Fae from beside me. ¡°Well, I was starting to think maybe we hadn¡¯t heard any of the aliens speak because the signals were being blocked by the slime, but according to this, they should be coming through just fine, so why haven¡¯t we picked up any pulses?¡± ¡°Huh, that¡¯s a good point.¡± Fae said, to which Sarah nodded after quickly calming down. ¡°So, what are you thinking?¡± She asked me, so I shared my thoughts. ¡°Hmm, I¡¯m thinking that either our intel was wrong and the pillslugs don¡¯t actually communicate with electric signals, or they are just going about their lives without ever feeling the need to communicate with each other. Ever. Which I¡¯m just not buying. So, if that last one is correct then that would imply someone else is pulling the strings, directing them somehow in a different way than how they would normally talk to each other.¡± ¡°Right, and depending on the circumstances, that could count as inhumanely exploiting a lesser species, so no wonder they would be trying to hide it.¡± Said Fae, to which Sarah agreed, saying ¡°It¡¯s worth telling the captain either way.¡± So, we got up to do just that, but were intercepted by Mike, who informed us that the tents were all set up and that Curt would be taking first watch in case any Guardians wandered too close, so the girls went on to give their report while we looked for a spot to settle down. ¡°Something wrong?¡± He asked, noticing my downcast gaze. ¡°Just wandering how accurate our intel was.¡± I gave him the abridged version, not wanting to get into it again, and being aware that, despite the fact that he was trying to be nice, he¡¯s actually even more easily scared than me, which was evidenced by how he almost stopped walking for a second and quickly swallowed, before changing topics entirely. ¡°Ah! Here we are, our own little treehouse!¡± He said, pointing excitedly at an unassuming tent filled with inflated air mattresses and sleeping bags, all around completely different from anyone¡¯s idea of what a treehouse would look like. ¡°But it¡¯s a tent?¡± I voiced my doubts, to which he answered with a grin. ¡°And we are inside of a tree, so¡­¡± ¡°A tree floating in space!¡± ¡°Then it¡¯s a space treehouse! How many people can say they¡¯ve been in one of those?¡± At that, I couldn¡¯t help myself. I chuckled, both at the absurdity of what he was saying and how it contrasted with our actual, unimpressive setup, mood successfully lifted and mind completely elsewhere. Chapter 3: Do Not The Weird Aliens.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CURT WOODSWARD SPEC: SCOUT/SUB-CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13.5 HOURS TO MISSION START
¡°Alright, let¡¯s finish packing everything up so we can go do some proper exploring!¡± Exclaimed Chloe, showcasing that boundless well of energy she always had whenever there was a job to be done. Not that the order was strictly necessary in this case, as we were almost completely done putting away our tents and beginning to settle into our usual formation. I had talked about the kinds of paths we should follow with Mike to give some direction to our exploration efforts, even though, strictly speaking, we didn¡¯t really know where we were going, and was just about to take point to lead the group through the tunnels ahead when I noticed something that made me pause. Sitting on the floor I was just about to step on, was a tiny one of those pillslugs. At just under 30 cm tall and twice as long, with a slimy, mottled green top and myriad legs barely poking out from under it, it was not nearly as big as some of the others we had seen, and it didn¡¯t really seem to be doing anything particularly important, so it was likely a juvenile, or something along those lines. ¡°Uh, guys! We have a bit of a tiny roadblock situation! You¡¯d better watch your steps!¡± I called out to the others after getting some distance from the little guy, before getting closer again and crouching down to give it a proper look. ¡°Huh, it¡¯s almost cute, in a sort of ¡®that thing had better not jump at me¡¯ kind of way¡± I muttered to no one in particular, although, naturally it was caught by the captain, who had walked up to assess the situation, and of course, because Murphy seems to hate me, caught me at what was probably the worst possible time. ¡°I¡¯m gonna name you Goobe-¡° ¡°Woodsward¡­¡± She said, with the tone of a disappointed parent. ¡°What did we say about interacting with the locals?¡± I flinched, not having heard her footsteps from being too distracted looking at little Goober. So, having been caught with my metaphorical pants down, I had no choice but to give her the answer she was looking for. ¡°Aye aye, Cap¡¯n.¡± I said, getting up from where I had crouched. ¡°Do not the weird aliens, I got it.¡± ¡°That¡¯s right,¡± she said, with some amount of condescension in her voice. ¡°do not approach them, do not touch them, do not disturb them, and just generally do not, so just let it pass, and we¡¯ll move on with our mission.¡± She finished, a small smile playing at her lips as her tone went from falsely condescending to amused. ¡°And besides, this is their world, you are the only weird alien here.¡± She finally added, all attempts to hide her humor having completely disappeared. ¡°I guess I walked right into that one.¡± I said with a chuckle.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CURT WOODSWARD SPEC: SCOUT/SUB-CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+10 DAYS TO MISSION START
I think I¡¯ve had it up to here with this dumb space tree. After walking and walking and trudging through bogs filled with slime, followed by more walking, for a whole week and change, I would very much like to say that I¡¯ve seen all there is to see in here. Of course, I don¡¯t even need to ask Mike to know that is not even close to the truth. It turns out, the colossal mega-structure that dwarfs even our mothership¡­ Is bigger on the inside! Imagine that! The sights were pretty nice, once you got used to everything being covered in sticky stuff, with narrow tunnels that led into vast, open chambers held together by columns that seemed to go on forever, and were themselves filled with tunnels and pillslugs industriously going in and out and up and down them in swarms of controlled chaos. We didn¡¯t get to explore these chambers due to the aforementioned swarm of creatures, but further exploration revealed sheer cliffs with sprawling vistas, lakes filled with drinking water that had settled above the ever-present slime without mixing at all, and even botanical gardens, containing both plants and fungi. Heh, growing trees inside of a tree, tree-nception.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. A few times, the path forward had been unreachable, due to it being at a higher elevation. The slugs apparently had no issue walking straight up walls but that wasn¡¯t something we could all copy without having someone fall on their ass at least once. In those cases, Mike proved his worth as a navigator, knowing exactly how much to backtrack to lead us to a spot where a quick use of an explosive charge could open a new path onward. Those were always risky to use, with the potential to draw a lot of attention, so we always made sure there were absolutely no locals around before using them, and legged it out of there immediately after. So far, our precautions had kept us out of danger, even if the first few uses had been more than a little nerve-wracking. But of course, this had all lost its novelty some days ago, and now, as I led the group through the labyrinthine tunnels, I was inwardly thanking Mike for having somehow kept track of our position the entire time. Sure, I might be able to retrace our steps from the last day and MAYBE get back to our pod, but if you asked me to get to anywhere specific, I would only be able to find it by chance. The captain, for her part, was proving to be as reliable as ever, even if she hadn¡¯t been able to properly use her unique talent of disabling the shit out of whatever poor soul decided to pick a fight with her. She had been picking up whenever I slacked out of sheer boredom and keeping a close eye on the science crew, who had been getting progressively more and more worried about not having detected any signals from the creatures no matter how much they fiddled with their tools. ¡°Alright everyone!¡± I said, as I finished inspecting a clearing that looked just like the ones we had made camp in the days before. It was so uncanny that I would have believed they were the same, had I not been told otherwise. ¡°This looks as good a spot as any, so let¡¯s¡­ you know¡­ do the thing.¡± I told the rest of the group and then proceeded to begin the work of setting up our tents. At this point, I was not even trying to hide my grumbling from them. Physical exhaustion is something I have a lot of training for, but the mental exhaustion that came from the monotony of this whole affair, was really starting to get to me, and I wasn¡¯t the only one, with Sarah and Alex openly sharing my thoughts, and everyone else pressing onwards out of fear of being the first to fall. When was the last time I played a prank on the big oaf, anyway? I thought to myself as Sarah and I finished pitching our tent, the air mattresses inside quickly inflating themselves thanks to some chemical reaction she had told me about at some point. ¡°Are we there yeeeet?¡± Sarah whined, having wasted no time getting into her sleeping bag and collapsing onto her mattress. ¡°Well, I don¡¯t know where we¡¯re going, but we are definitely somewhere.¡± I said, like a smartass, which was apparently the wrong thing to say, as my only answer was a groan. It can¡¯t have been too wrong of an answer though, since she quickly signaled for me to join her in the tent, and we both almost immediately passed out, comfortably lying next to each other in companionable silence, this being a night when we weren¡¯t scheduled to keep a look out.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CURT WOODSWARD SPEC: SCOUT/SUB-CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+11 DAYS TO MISSION START
I returned to consciousness to Sarah¡¯s sleeping face right in front of me, so that was a good way to start the day. What wasn¡¯t as good, however, were Alice¡¯s vaguely confused screams of ¡±Uh.. Help!¡± That quickly got everyone up and rushing in their direction. ¡°Status!¡± Captain Chloe commanded, not wasting a second. ¡°Uhm, well¡­¡± Alice responded, seemingly not picking up on the urgency in the captain¡¯s tone. ¡°We kinda forgot to fully close our tent¡¯s flap after our watch last night and¡­¡± She trailed off while fully opening the flap to reveal the tent¡¯s interior, along with one completely paralyzed Michael Hayes and¡­ ¡°Hey! That¡¯s Goober!¡± I said, drawing quizzical looks from everyone and a facepalm from Chloe. ¡°What? I found it a few days ago, looks like it¡¯s been following us. It likes you!¡± I told everyone my thoughts on the little creature that had climbed onto our poor navigator while he was asleep. My explanation was almost cut short by Mike¡¯s sobbing ¡°W-w-w-what do I do?¡± ¡°Do not the weird aliens.¡± The captain repeated her mantra, not really helping calm his fears. ¡°That¡¯s not helping!¡± He said, proving my point. ¡°Just calm down, stay still, let it get off of you on its own, and then you can slowly get out of the tent.¡± The captain told him, and he quickly tried to steady his breathing before responding between gasps. ¡°Ok¡­ Ok¡­ I think I can- OW!¡± He startled, sending poor little Goober flying past all of us. ¡°That thing bit me!¡± He exclaimed, more to himself than to anybody else. ¡°Uhm, guys¡­ I just picked up an electric pulse.¡± Interjected Fae, likely the one person thinking about anything important at the moment, namely how Mike had just broken the one rule of ¡®Do Not the weird aliens¡¯. ¡°You think it might have been a distress sig-¡° Tried to say Alice, but was quickly interrupted by the captain, taking command of the situation. ¡°Yup! Time to move! Emergency evac as practiced, right now!¡± She commanded in no uncertain terms Chapter 4: Class 7 My Ass!
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: MICHAEL HAYES SPEC: NAVIGATOR
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+11 DAYS TO MISSION START
Oh, shit! Oh, Fuck! Oh, no! And other such thoughts were all that was going through my head, as I lay on a fireman¡¯s carry atop of Alex¡¯s shoulders. There were so many of the Guardians on our asses as we booked it to our fallback position in our escape pod, in the hopes of being able to use its hatch as a barrier between us and the loose collection of teeth, limbs, fangs, claws and tentacles that were currently chasing us. And of course, being hauled by the guy in charge of taking up the rear, I had front row seats and no distractions to watch the incoming tide of flesh. They said this was a Class 7! How are there so many of them?! Why are they so huge?! Whoever didn¡¯t include nightmare fuel in the list of things that can make a world uninhabitable needs a kick in the ass! I was jolted out of my rant as Alex made a tight, near 180 degrees turn and our group hid in a small alcove just beyond a turn on a T intersection. Our pursuers turned to follow us, but then appeared confused at us having taken our chance to hide while out of their sight. I don¡¯t know what¡¯s worse, how gross they all are, or how different they are from each other. And that was the thing, it was as if we were being chased by a collection of the greatest hits of all movie monsters ever conceived. Some of them resembled large wolves with six legs, others were more like bears, and more still had a body plan along the lines of those prehistoric land crocs Alice had once told me about. There were also some that looked like dinosaurs, a few apes with oversized arms that walked on two legs, and even some insectoid ones that looked ready to take revenge on every windshield that ever hit one of their kind, along with the person behind that windshield and their whole extended family. The only common trait shared between all of them was their sickly, slimy brownish green color, and that they all had varying numbers of flailing spike-tipped tentacles that seemed hell bent on getting a taste of everyone and everything around them, which just made them all the more horrifying. As if this wasn¡¯t enough, the underside of those tentacles were lined with uncountable wriggling insectoid legs for an extra dose of ¡®fuck no!¡¯ that was, honestly, completely uncalled for. As if to reignite the panic that I had just barely managed to put under control, I suddenly found myself in free fall, and later lying on the ground face up, absolutely drenched in the ever-present slime that covered everything in here. ¡°All right, princess! Time to step up! Where the fuck are we?!¡± Alex demanded immediately after dumping me on my ass. I worried that those creatures would hear him, but apparently Chloe and Curt had made sure they were gone before allowing anyone to kick up a fuss. Not that that information had any chance to stay in my brain, given my current state, and being given permission to scream by Alex leading by example, my mouth simply had to make my thoughts known. ¡°WHAT THE FUCK ARE THO-¡° I cut off as Alex grabbed me by the shoulders and pinned me against a wall and, apparently having noticed his previous mistake, whispered his next words in a tone that made them come out almost like a hiss. ¡°Listen. Those are the Guardians we¡¯ve been avoiding all this time. Even if this is a class 7, there¡¯s enough of them that an open fight would be too big a risk. Now, with how we took off, none of us has any clue where the fuck we are, so we need you to get us a quick path to the pod. Can. You. Do. That?¡± He ordered, more than asked, but that had been what I needed to put a lid on my growing panic and channel all of my flowing adrenaline into something productive. ¡°Right¡­ Right, ok¡­ I can do that.¡± I said, more to myself than anybody else, before opening up the bit of holographic software that I had been using to keep track of our position. The program could trace our steps without the need of human input, but it fell on me to make sense of the information it recorded, by marking the size, height, distinguishing features and any off-shoots in the tunnels we moved through, and I was also responsible with tracing our steps whenever the mothership¡¯s orbit prevented it from being fed the telemetry it needed to triangulate our position. Luckily that hadn¡¯t happened this time, or we really would be doomed, but my inspection revealed something slightly problematic. ¡°So, we are not far from the pod as the crow flies, but since the monsters came from a tunnel we had already walked through and forced us to run in the opposite direction¡­¡± I explained to the group, with Curt being the first to recognize the problem, putting it in his own words. ¡°You¡¯re saying we are in uncharted space.¡± ¡°Right,¡± I continued. ¡°So, we can either keep going in roughly the direction of the pod and we might get there before getting spotted again¡­¡± I let that hang in the air for a second, in case someone had a way of making it work and sparing us from having to go with my plan B. When nobody spoke up, I sighed and shared it. ¡°Or, we could blast a hole through the wall here, which would put us in a tunnel I¡¯ve already mapped, giving us a path to follow that is guaranteed to get us there.¡± ¡°That would also put them on our ass from the start.¡± Commented Alex, immediately pointing out the big issue with this plan. ¡°We¡¯ll have to run with our feet getting caught in the slime, and I¡¯m not carrying you the rest of the way.¡± ¡°What¡¯s stopping us from moving further up this tunnel and making a hole once we are closer to the pod?¡± Asked the captain, raising a valid point that I unfortunately had to shoot down. ¡°Two things. First, we don¡¯t know if the path ahead actually runs closer to our destination, so walking further down it could be a waste of time, or worse, we might have to backtrack.¡± I started, and Curt also added his own thoughts. ¡°Right, and anything that¡¯s actually tracking us instead of just looking randomly will have found this place already.¡± ¡°We don¡¯t know if they are actually tracking us! We¡¯ve been going around this place for a week and a half and nothing batted an eye.¡± Pointed out Fae, but the captain quickly shut down all speculation, saying: ¡°We have no choice but to act under the assumption that they have some way of tracking us, or we risk getting caught off guard.¡±This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. ¡°Second,¡± I continued. ¡°Making a hole near here would put us on a relatively straight path to the pod, with a few turns but no need to get off the first tunnel we enter. If we were to move further, we might have to either blast several holes into different walls or take a winding path with many sharp bends, where going down the wrong intersection could easily lead to a dead end.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t think I have that many bombs left¡­¡± Complained Curt, and that pretty much decided our course of action. ¡°Alright then, Alex, take the charge, Curt and I will make sure there are no hostiles around. When we give the signal, everybody take cover and blow that thing open. After that, we book it. Alex, you are our battering ram, I want you at the front. I will be right behind you, followed by Mike guiding our path, then the rest of the science crew, and Curt watching our backs. Are we clear?¡± Ordered the captain, with the confidence of an experienced leader that bolstered our spirits just enough to make this mad dash to safety.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALEXANDER BELMONT SPEC: GUNNER
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+11 DAYS TO MISSION START
To whatever cosmic entity that heard my complaints that this whole trip had been getting even more boring than life in that empty rock, you can go fuck yourself! For as long as I live, I will make sure that no one ever finds this out, but the truth was, I was this close to losing my shit. It was only the fact that Mike had crossed that threshold just a second earlier that had made me keep it together. Now, however, now we had a plan, and that plan involved going hard and fast and making sure that whatever tried to get in our way, didn¡¯t. And I could work with that. It didn¡¯t take long for the scouting duo to give us the signal, so we quickly got into loose formation behind cover and hit the button to detonate the charge. FOOMP! The sound was that strange one I had heard all those other times we used one of Curt¡¯s fancy bombs that were designed to throw around minimal shrapnel while still blasting an opening in the surface they were attached to, along with any unfortunate souls who didn¡¯t get the memo to stand back. Hearing my cue as the head of our formation, I took off in the direction Mike had indicated, confident that the rest would follow closely behind, and no sooner than I did, the entire place seemed to come alive with an echoing screech that shook the walls and had no origin point that I could locate, not that I really tried as I focused on moving fast and making sure nothing got to those in our group that hadn¡¯t trained for a fight for days on end. It didn¡¯t take long for those creatures to start showing up. The tunnel we were sprinting through was relatively wide, but didn¡¯t have all that many openings that could connect it to others, which meant most hostiles would be coming at us from either the front or the back, and that explained the captain¡¯s decision to place me and Curt in those positions. Especially me at the front. There weren¡¯t many gardenworlders that saw fit to pick a fight with a human, and those that did wouldn¡¯t try it against one that weighed over 150 kg at over 2 meters tall. Not many humans would either, so despite the danger, that it would normally be frowned upon, and having to remind myself not to lose sight of my responsibilities, this was actually a bit of a dream come true for me. Having the opportunity to barrel through an opposing force that could do little to oppose you was many kids¡¯ fantasies, and while playing with the pipsqueak was fun, the slippery little shit didn¡¯t make it easy. I opened fire with my gatling gun when I saw the approaching tide of flesh, which got them to scatter and slow down somewhat, but failed to stop them. That was fine, we were only carrying space rated ammunition designed to not punch holes in the hulls of ships that would start venting atmosphere. I eyed the leading creature with a combination of nervous and anxious anticipation. It was one of those six-legged wolf things. Alright freaks, time to learn what happens when you get in the way of- OOMPH! I had to quickly catch my breath, as the thing that I was planning to lift and use to ram its companions met my charge. And actually stopped it. What¡¯s worse, it had me outgunned, with strength that I couldn¡¯t just shove aside, an additional pair of arms ending in nasty claws, and dangerous looking fangs that it was all I could do to keep away from my face, not to mention its tentacles that were bracing it against the walls and ceiling, but could turn and skewer me at any moment. It was at that moment that I began to think I might have fucked up. Luckily for me, as I was holding its jaws at bay, a black spike emerged from my blind spot and skewered the thing through the throat, before emerging out of a new hole at the top of its skull. The thing was dead instantly. The captain stepped past me, not bothering to clean the brains off her stick before using it to slap the face of some velociraptor looking creature that was darting towards us. Its momentum carried it past her and she took that opportunity to grab it by the neck with her other hand, causing its body to sail past and whip back, painfully being struck by inertia as its head was halted in her arms. She pivoted to place the creature at her back, between her and the approaching hoard, and gave me a knowing look. Understanding what she meant, I grabbed her meat shield by what I guessed passed for its throat with my right hand, tossed it at the approaching creatures and opened fire on it with my left. At point blank range, the effect was much greater than the last time I had tried this, but it still failed to turn the wave of creatures into so much Swiss cheese like I had expected it. But that was fine. All I needed was to stop them from mobbing us. Working together with Captain Chloe, we managed to slowly, painfully but surely clear a path that got us closer and closer to our destination, and from the sound of powerful gunshots going off behind me, I would imagine the pipsqueak was having a similar time of it. I had to curse these things for not letting me get a look at how he wrangled his oversized rifle like he had something to compensate for, but my hands were more than full at the moment, so I had to settle for punching my problems alongside the captain, who hadn¡¯t even bothered using her handgun after seeing what my own gun had done, or more accurately failed to do. ¡°Who the fuck said this was a Class 7?!¡± I asked, needing to vent as I started running out of breath. ¡°Me.¡± She responded, the hint of a smile in her face revealing she knew that was not what I had meant, but she still went along with her joke for my sake. Eventually, through literal blood, sweat and tears, we got close enough to our pod that we could finally see it, our bodies at that point battered, bruised, slashed, bitten, stabbed, and all around not having a good day. Just as we got almost close enough to touch it, however, something happened. I say something, because I truly have no idea what it was. All I know is that something had come at me from the side and knocked me on my ass, then wasted no time in pinning me down. With the curse of hindsight, I realized that in order to get to the pod, we had to make a blind turn into a T intersection, and already having our hands full and so close to our goal, we didn¡¯t bother to check our corners, and that negligence had come running to beat me senseless. I barely got a look at the captain avoiding a large creature like the one that was on me before another one caught her and slammed her into the ground. Immediately after that, I felt the pain of something heavy smacking me in the head, and my head then smacking into the ground before my world went dark.
[SUBJECT COMPROMISED. MEMORY RECORDING STOPPED] Chapter 5: Caught and broken
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+11 DAYS TO MISSION START
I could hear a faint murmuring in the background that really needed to stop. Most of it was obscured by the incessant ringing in my ears as they conspired to keep me from going back to blissful sleep, I didn¡¯t even want to open my eyes lest I find some other reason to get up from this comfy, if fairly damp, spot. Eventually, however, as the ringing slowly died down, I could start to make out words being spoken among the background noise; things along the lines of ¡®-even are we?¡¯, ¡®why haven¡¯t they killed us?¡¯, ¡®because they¡¯re gonna feed our brains to the brainslug, obviously¡¯, and ¡®I don¡¯t know, that was terrifying!¡¯ and other such nonsense. As my rebellious brain went through the painful process of forming coherent thoughts against my will, the idea that the background noise that I had tried to ignore might actually be important slowly wormed its way into my mind, prompting me to begin the process of rebooting my ass back into a functioning state. Where am I? Who am I? What day is it? Why does my head hurt so much? It was a slow process. After some amount of time, I managed to open my eyes, and quickly closed them after being blinded by a combination of bright lighting and gunk trying to get into them. That, however, quickly got me up and about. I quickly cleaned my face of all the slime I had been lying on and gave my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the light which, in hindsight, hadn¡¯t been as bright as I¡¯d first thought. I found myself in some kind of prison cell, with bars made up of weird tentacle things that protruded from the ceiling and floors, meeting in the middle and gripping their opposite piece, then pulled tightly against each other. The walls and floors were the same slime covered surface I¡¯d got used to in the past week and a half, and the illumination was that same sickly yellow emanated from randomly distributed but consistently disgusting pustules that seemed to be growing out of everywhere. Pulling apart what passed for the bars of my cell as much as I could, I could make out six other cells just like mine surrounding a wide, circular open space, presumably each holding one member of my crew. ¡°Somebody tell me what the fuck¡¯s going on.¡± I ordered groggily, stifling a yawn in the process. Maybe I should have said that with more urgency, but as far as I could tell there were no immediate dangers beside the fact that, you know, we were clearly and purposefully caged, so I figured it best not to act in a way that might cause further panic and instead try to downplay and de-escalate the situation so we could look at it with cooler heads. ¡°Captain, you¡¯re awake!¡± Sarah shouted, causing a flare in my slowly receding tinnitus. ¡°Curt woke up some time ago, and Alex just a few minutes after, Fae would not stop worrying. All of us are here, mostly unharmed if more than a little shaken. The three of you were the only ones that got knocked out, while the rest of us got restrained and dumped here. They¡¯ve taken all our weapons and messed up Alex¡¯s arm, but other than that, they didn¡¯t really go through most of our equipment, so we still have whatever random stuff we had on us when we ran from camp, and local comms are still up. We are expecting the rescue team to have been deployed from the mothership, but since they only got incomplete maps from us, their ETA is unknown¡± She finished her report, quickly giving me all the relevant information, some of it relieving, other parts worrying. While she was telling me all that, I had been trying to find a way out through the ¡®bars¡¯ of my cage. For being made of flexible tentacle-y stuff, they were surprisingly strong, being pulled extremely tightly against each other. I could see the spot where they met and held on, but having lost my knife, my spikes and my handgun, there was nothing I could do to get them to let go. ¡°Damn, these things are tough. How¡¯re you doing big guy? Any chance at getting out or giving any of us a Swiss-army hand?¡± I asked Alex, who turned out to be on one of the farthest cells from mine. ¡°No shot, I can¡¯t get any good leverage, and my arm is all gunked up, can¡¯t fire, can¡¯t change configuration.¡± He explained. ¡°So stuck lugging a gun that can¡¯t shoot, and I¡¯m guessing it¡¯s gonna take Fae and a few hours to clean it. You sure there¡¯s nothing you can do with it?¡±. The answer I got to that question told me that he was never gonna give me up, never gonna let me down, never gonna run around and desert me. Amusing and reassuring, but not immediately helpful, and extremely annoying that of all the frankly uncountable things installed in that arm, the only thing working was the music player. ¡°Right, well, anybody else have any ideas?¡± I asked the group that had been staying silent to see if I had a plan of my own or an idea that they could help with. I had a few of those, but none of them were as safe as I¡¯d like. Curt was the first to speak up. ¡°They didn¡¯t take my bombs, I could get out whenever, just not without killing myself in the process. My cell isn¡¯t big enough to get clear of the blast radius.¡± ¡°Then if someone else can get out and you hand them your bombs, they could get the rest of us out, then we book it.¡± Added Fae. ¡°That still means we need someone else to get out first, though, and without making so much noise that they get thrown right back in.¡± She finished somewhat quietly, already in deep thought. ¡°About that, I think I might have an idea.¡± It was Alice who spoke this time. ¡°These ¡®bar tentacles¡¯ are permanently covered in slime, so they must be used to being damp at all times with little to adjust the humidity going in and out of them, like regular earth slugs, so if we can drain the moisture from them, they might shrivel up enough that we can break one and squeeze out.¡± ¡°That¡¯s genius!¡± Yelled Mike, clearly using optimism to mask his fears, although to be fair, he wasn¡¯t wrong. ¡°Sarah, you got anything that can suck up moisture left on you?¡± I asked her, to which she replied without as much confidence as I would have liked. ¡°Some anhydrous magnesium sulfate and calcium chloride. I didn¡¯t get to pack up the sulfuric acid since we had to leave running, but if they are anything like earth slugs, it should do the trick?¡± ¡°It should!¡± Alice confirmed. ¡°Alright,¡± said Sarah with a rising infectious enthusiasm that led to her taking charge of putting together a plan. ¡°So, this is probably gonna take a while, but once I¡¯m out, I get the bombs from Curt, blast everyone out, and then Mike can lead us back to the pod.¡± None of us dared to interrupt her, since she was clearly on a roll, and even I had nothing to add. The plan was sketchy at best, involving running away after a loud blast, which was what had got us into this situation in the first place, but at the moment, it was the best plan we had. ¡°Right, then we are all set, Mike, you know our way out?¡± I said with a confidence I wasn¡¯t really feeling so we could all get out of here as soon as possible. ¡°¡­Uhm.¡± Was the reply I got. Because that was exactly what we needed. ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± I asked him ¡°Well, I do have our path here recorded but beyond retracing our exact steps I have no idea where we¡¯d be going and¡­ how do we know that won¡¯t get us caught again?¡± ¡°We don¡¯t, but it¡¯s still better than sitting here waiting to see what they do with us.¡± I answered with finality, putting an end to this particular argument before it could even start. It wouldn¡¯t help anybody to worry about things beyond our control. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we¡¯ve still got everyone and none of us are hurt, the captain will look out for us.¡± Alice spoke reassuringly. ¡°Yeah! And I saw them drop our stuff past that bend on the way over, we can even get our weapons back! I¡¯ll make sure to pick them up while you plot a course.¡± Fae lied reassuringly. While Mike audibly calmed down, I would assume visibly too but I couldn¡¯t see him through the ¡®bars¡¯ of his cell, I ordered: ¡°Then we have a plan, Sarah, get to work on getting out!¡± ¡°Already on it!¡± ¡­ ¡°Is it working?¡± I asked after a little while, once the adrenaline I had built up had worn off. ¡°It¡¯s doing something!¡± She replied. ¡°Something to get us out or¡­?¡± ¡°I said it would be a while!¡±
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+11 DAYS TO MISSION START
I had almost dozed off when I heard some strained grunts coming from Sarah¡¯s cell, so I quickly made a little peep-hole between the bars to see what was going on.This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. There I saw Sarah, who had managed to break exactly one of the ¡®bars¡¯ and was slowly squeezing her way out of incarceration. Of course, breaking one ¡®bar¡¯ meant the opening in between them went from being just wide enough for a couple fingers to just enough to fit an arm through, so it was still a tight fit. ¡°Come on!¡± ¡°You¡¯ve got this!¡± She was cheered on by Alice, who was in the cell right to her left and Mike, in the next one over. She slowly and laboriously got more and more of her body through the still small opening until eventually- PLOP! She flopped down and faceplanted on the soft and damp floors of our prison, from where she cheered to herself for a quick second, almost half her body still stuck between the bars but her top half having breached confinement. The happiness was short lived however, as we all heard it. Plop. Plop. The footsteps of something approaching, and the fact that it even produced footsteps we could hear meant it was trouble. With a grunt, I quickly got back to trying uselessly to brute force an opening through my cage I could use to provide some help, and from what I could tell, I wasn¡¯t the only one, but then again, not all of us were doing that. ¡°SHIT! GET BACK IN THE CAGE!¡± Yelled Mike, uselessly, since getting back in would require just as much effort as getting out. In fact, that outburst only confused her and reduced the interval between the approaching footfalls. In a second that seemed to last forever, I saw it, the misshapen face of one of the creature¡¯s ¡®Guardians¡¯ came around a corner, followed by another, then another, all wildly different except for the many tentacles flailing at their backs. I could practically see the gears in our warden¡¯s head turn as it spotted one human mostly out of her cage with one foot stuck in it and another prisoner still in his cage, screaming his lungs out. The thing quickly lunged on the semi-prone would-be escapee. It was yet another of the six-legged wolf things, yet unlike before, where our physical state was evidence that they had kept us mostly unharmed, when it reached Sarah, it began tearing her to shreds, ripping apart her protective equipment with fangs, claws and tentacle spikes, making me redouble my efforts in getting out. This was nothing in comparison to Curt, however, who fought the tendrils blocking his path with a righteous, impotent fury and a shower of expletives that was honestly scary. The other two monsters followed the first at a casual pace and went towards the cages closest to the one that had been broken out of, those being Alice and Mike¡¯s. As soon as her cage was opened, Alice attempted to make a mad dash past our captors but was quickly restrained and treated just like the previous attempted escapee, while when the last warden went to open Mike¡¯s cage, it revealed him utterly paralyzed by fear, but it didn¡¯t manage to catch him. ¡°GET AWAY FROM HER YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!¡± Yelled the raging storm that had once been Curt Woodsward, somehow having managed to squeeze between the ¡®bars¡¯ without breaking them, and proceeded to punt the one restraining his partner in its cranium. To his credit, despite clearly not being in his right mind, he put up an impressive fight, dodging and weaving between fangs and claws, but, outnumbered and unarmed, he was eventually blindsided by a tentacle that caught him in the back and likely stabbed one of his kidneys. After that, he wasn¡¯t in any state to fight even one of the monsters, much less three, so he was quickly pinned down and treated just like everyone else that had tried to make a run for it. The repetition didn¡¯t make it any less painful to watch. Slightly bruised, missing one or two teeth, but otherwise unscathed, the creatures retreated with what was left of three of the members of my crew, and I slumped up against the wall of my cage in defeat. Nobody else said a word. We were likely all in shock at having watched our friends get brutally murdered in front of our eyes, or, if not that then terrified at the thought of us being next.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°Psst, Hey Cap.¡± I heard someone whisper to me from the direction of my cell¡¯s front as I sat on the far side with my knees held between my arms. My first thought had been to tell them to fuck off, since I was too busy mourning my friends, co-workers and housemates, but then I remembered our situation. The monsters had opened up three of our cages, and taken the lives of three of us, but there had been four people who got out. Sarah had been caught after making it out, and Curt as well, while Alice got caught when they opened her cage, which would mean¡­ ¡°Mike?¡± I asked, equal parts hopeful and confused. ¡°That¡¯s me!¡± He answered cheerfully. ¡°How the fu-¡° I was about to ask, but he interrupted me, already having an answer prepared. ¡°Honestly? No idea how I didn¡¯t get caught. They must have forgotten about me when Curt got out, cause I just hid in the far corner of the hall and it worked!¡± No way in hell his panic attack is gonna be what saves the rest of us. Fuck it, it worked, don¡¯t question it. ¡°Any idea how the rest of us could get out? I figured if Curt got out then maybe Fae can as well, she¡¯s even shorter than him so-¡° I was pondering when he interrupted me. ¡°About that, I took a look further up the corridor, I didn¡¯t see our friends but I did find their stuff just lying there. Including Curt¡¯s bombs.¡± At that I almost had to pick my jaw up off the floor. Alright, no time for depression, grown-up pants time! ¡°You absolute genius! Have you set them up yet?¡± ¡°Yup, Fae walked me through it, your cell was the farthest one so¡­ here¡¯s the detonator!¡± He said, for some reason embarrassed about the fact that his plan could have left me to die while he got everyone else out. I didn¡¯t even blame him, I would have done the same in his position rather than waste time moving back and forth. As I was about to grab the detonator, however¡­ Plop. I barely heard the footsteps of another warden coming around a corner before quickly reaching out and yanking the detonator from Mike¡¯s hand. I didn¡¯t have time to do anything else before it was on him, however, and it quickly had him pinned and was digging its tentacle spikes into his back. At that moment, I had a choice to make. For all I knew, and having seen what they¡¯d done to the other people they¡¯d caught, Mike was already dead. If I pulled the trigger then, he would definitely get caught in the blast, but so would the creature pinning him down, then maybe the rest of us could make a run for it. But then I looked into the eyes of the man I was about to kill, and I saw a hope there that refused to die, a confident belief that I could still help him get through this, and I just couldn¡¯t do it. I quickly pocketed the detonator, knowing that with the bombs already placed Fae would have no trouble setting them off even without it, and watched as Mike was dragged off away from my cage, once again feeling utterly defeated. What I didn¡¯t expect however, was for the tendrils that made up the bars of my cage to release each other and retreat to their origin points, as another of the hulking monstrosities stood there. Before I could even react, it¡¯s tentacles shot forward and got me right in both shoulders, severely limiting the use of my arms, and just like that, it was over for me too. Unarmed, I didn¡¯t stand much of a chance against however many creatures there were, injured I stood none. ¡­ I was almost entirely numb as they dragged me and the somehow still breathing Mike along several corridors that I could not have told apart on the best of days, only aware of the fact that we were moving up a slope. Eventually we arrived at an open chamber whose walls, floor and ceiling were almost entirely made up of those glowing pustules that produced a blinding luminescence it took me a second to adjust to. ¡°The hell are we?¡± I muttered to myself, not really expecting a reply, so I was surprised when I got one. ¡°Roughly above the prison cells.¡± Said Mike, who in my stupor I had almost forgotten was there. I took a look at the walls as we were walked towards the far end of the chamber, the short conversation having awakened a feeling of curiosity in me, and I noted that this place, unlike the rest of this goddamn space tree, was almost entirely slime free, thanks to it being covered in the yellow light emitting sacs. On closer inspection I also noted that whatever spots weren¡¯t covered in light sacs, which I had previously thought would be the usual soft and slimy material that had covered everything here, were instead occupied by giant pillslugs, easily more than three meters long, held vertically with their countless writhing legs facing the inside of the chamber. Had I not been disassociating quite as hard; the sight would have made me puke. As we neared the far wall that marked the end of this chamber, I noted three of the giant pillslugs that, unlike the rest, were sitting on the floor right side up, or as right as these creatures could get, and next to them, waited an amalgamation of every nightmare there ever was, given physical form. The thing looked like an elongated pillslug, held high above the ground by a pair of dinosaur-like legs, with four clearly endoskeletal arms and four wriggling tentacles poking out of seemingly random spots on its body. With it being a pillslug that didn¡¯t crawl along the ground, its many insectile legs were clearly visible at all times, with the few dozen or so nearest to its front end being longer and seeming to form a freaky set of mandibles. The thing, of course, was much bigger than it had any right to be, easily being able to see eye to eye with Alex. As we approached, the abomination perked up slightly, and the three pillslugs that had been lying peacefully on the ground were lifted up by a set of tendrils emanating from the walls so that they lay up against it, now perpendicular to the floor. This revealed their undersides and¡­ something. Held in each of the giant pillslug¡¯s countless legs was¡­ The best way to describe it would be a humanoid version of the Guardians that had caused so much trouble, only¡­ deconstructed, for lack of a better word. They were basically cut to pieces at each of the major joints, which were then connected by a stringy tendon looking material, so while their head and torso were relatively intact, the arms were detached from it, hanging by that stringy material and seemingly ready to fall away at any second, then the forearms were cut off at the elbow, only connected by that weird tendon. The same thing happened at the hands, the pelvis, the knees and ankles. It was a sight that was as terrifying as it was bizarre. Of course, as the abomination finished getting up and started walking towards these three things, the whole scene somehow got worse. The center creature¡¯s eyes suddenly focused on me, its mouth twisting into a facsimile of a smile. It raised its forearm, moving in the same way a normal arm would bend at the elbow, only leaving its hand behind where it was held by the giant pillslug. The hand that had been left behind by the body part it should have been attached to, gave me a small wave. ¡°Hi Captain.¡± It said with Sarah¡¯s voice. Chapter 6: Falling Apart.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: MICHAEL HAYES SPEC: NAVIGATION
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°Hi Captain.¡± It said with Sarah¡¯s voice, but my mind was completely elsewhere, for while the center creature gave Chloe a little greeting, I was transfixed by the one to its right, which was, in turn, staring at me. I couldn¡¯t believe my eyes. I didn¡¯t want to believe them, yet at the same time I did. My mind raced as it processed which version of reality would be preferable, one where my gut feeling was proven correct or false, and came up far short of an answer. Eventually, however, the captive creature gave me a smile, and all my doubts were washed away. There it is, that is what I used to live for. That smile had never failed to give me the warm fuzzies. This time, however, for the first time ever, it did. In fact, it made my stomach twist in complete dread as my mind struggled to process how to handle this situation. So distracted was I that I didn¡¯t notice the chimeric abomination slowly approaching the one that held my focus until it stuck one of its freaky arms near the back of her neck. ¡°A-Ali-¡° I tried to call out, but was interrupted. ¡°Hmmm¡­ Electromagnetic and atmospheric vibration sensitivity with alternative communication, relatively high muscle density and cognitive function, and a versatile body plan¡­ Yes, you will be most useful.¡± The creature spoke in clear if somewhat garbled English after, presumably, having poked into Alice¡¯s brain. This, after everything that we had recently been through, finally broke me. I tried to move, to push the monster away but my limbs failed me, tried to say something, but words escaped me. I couldn¡¯t even find the words to describe such a profound violation as twisting a person¡¯s body and probing their mind, only to call them ¡®useful¡¯ immediately after. The action was utterly repulsive, unspeakable¡­ Hell, inconceivable- ¡°That shit¡¯s fucked.¡± Said the captain, pulling my mind back into reality. Ah¡­ Fair enough, I guess she found the right words to describe it. ¡°So you say, but in truth, this is a welcoming ceremony. A happy day.¡± The creature spoke, once again bringing my nightmares to life. The captain didn¡¯t immediately respond, instead eyeing the creature warily. When she finally spoke, it was to try and gain information from our captors, as though our original mission in coming here wasn¡¯t already fucked beyond belief. ¡°So, I¡¯m assuming this is where all your freaky Guardians come from. I¡¯d be impressed if I wasn¡¯t so disgusted. Anyway, since we can apparently speak, on whose orders are you acting? I believe they will be more than a little pissed when they see what you¡¯ve done.¡± She asked, putting the weight of our people¡¯s wrath behind her words. It was a bluff, naturally, nobody wanted an all-out war between societies capable of accelerating any object to relativistic speeds, and even then, there might be no undoing what¡¯s been done to them. What¡¯s been done to Alice¡­ ¡°Hhnngrh¡­¡± The creature made a noise like a thousand skittering bugs all grinding chalk on a blackboard at once. ¡°The ignorance of the uninformed, always failing to appreciate the beauty of metamorphosis before their eyes. No matter, we¡¯ll make a hero out of you yet. In the meantime¡­¡± It continued as it removed its appendage from the back of what might be Alice¡¯s neck. Suddenly, with a slurping noise, the stringy material connecting the different, detached body parts on all three peop¡­ beings, held by the giant pillslugs were pulled taut, as though they were strings being pulled by an invisible puppeteer, placing all of their limbs into their corresponding sockets. A second later, they were released from their bindings and fell to the floor, where they caught themselves with their hands and knees, which were apparently now properly attached. The abomination ignored this, however, as it slowly crept closer to us, stopping just out of arm¡¯s reach. At this distance, I could see the viscous slime practically oozing off every surface of this thing. I expected to be assaulted by its smell, but anything coming off it was practically indistinguishable from what emanated from our surroundings. ¡°¡­I¡¯m curious to see what it was that you¡¯ve been so careful to keep hidden since you were pulled from your cage.¡± The monster completely ignored the captain¡¯s line of questioning with an accusatory inquiry of its own. The woman beside me barely managed to hide a smirk behind a grimace as she reached into one of her concealed pockets. ¡°This.¡± She said, producing the detonator for the charges we had set up, and then the floor beneath us collapsed.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALEXANDER BELMONT SPEC: GUNNER
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°So, are we doing this, or¡­?¡± Asked the tiny woman sitting on my lap. At some point, Fae, being even smaller than the¡­ Curt. Had managed to worm her way out of her cell and into mine, not wanting to be caught out in the open like everyone else. She had then got to work on fixing up my arm until it was mostly capable of moving and shooting, although true repairs would have to wait until we were safe. At the moment we were discussing whether we should override the detonator on the explosive charges set near the end of our prison cells, a task which would have been easy, if not for the fact that not knowing what the captain, who held the actual detonator, was going through, meant that at any moment an invisible signal could make them go off, likely catching whoever happened to be working on the bombs in the blast. Since that would have to be the little fairy, I was strongly against the idea. Or rather, I had been against it. As it stood, the longer we waited, the more likely it was that some creature would walk in and finish us off, so eventually I had to relent. ¡°It¡¯s been radio silent for a while. Longer than I¡¯m comfortable with, so fine, blow the thing.¡± I said, but just as she got up to do just that, she was interrupted by our comms coming to life. ¡°The hell are we?¡± Came Chloe¡¯s voice through the device, and she was answered by Mike, whose voice was barely audible: ¡°-bove the prison cells.¡± ¡°They¡¯re alive!¡± Fae said, her excitement coming just short of turning her words into a scream as hope returned to her eyes. ¡°They are.¡± I agreed, a smile forming in my face at knowing that at least some of our colleagues were still around. ¡°Do you think that means Alice and the rest are-?¡± She started saying, but stopped herself. Of all of us, Alice had been the one with the mildest temper; her eternally calm demeanor, which even in tough situations only ever escalated to worried or annoyed at most, was a soothing presence for all of us, and especially for the ever-excitable Mike, whose tendency to jump at every surprise was anchored by the woman¡¯s down to earth personality. Watching her go had been especially heartbreaking. ¡°That shit¡¯s fucked.¡± Came the captain¡¯s voice, and if we had hoped we might be able to glean information about their situation through this device, those hopes were immediately dashed by the captain¡¯s sometimes surprisingly abysmal communication skills. ¡°Do you think that means¡­?¡± Fae started again, but stopped herself as we both shared a look of confusion, and resigned ourselves to keep listening in on the situation until we could come up with a viable¡­ Well, not plan, but at least a course of action. ¡°So, I¡¯m assuming this is where all your freaky Guardians come from. I¡¯d be impressed if I wasn¡¯t so disgusted. Anyway, since we can apparently speak, on whose orders are you acting? I believe they will be more than a little pissed when they see what you¡¯ve done.¡± The captain¡¯s voice came out of our communication devices, once again doing little to give us any idea what was going on on their end, other than that she was talking to somebody. Does that mean she found the one in charge? Not likely since she was asking for their superiors, but she might have found out who got these slugs into space. ¡°This.¡± The captain said, a second before the charges went off and the entire ceiling caved in. On the one hand, our exit was clear, blocked only by a bunch of rubble that Chloe was slowly digging herself out of. On the other, it was suddenly pandemonium out there, with a mess of screeches and screams echoing through the halls and literally making the walls vibrate. ¡°Orders?¡± I asked in as few words as possible while I helped the captain come free of her interment. ¡°Fucking¡­ To the pod, MOVE!¡± She said with a groan. I went to help her get up but she pushed me away. ¡°Go! I¡¯ll catch up, do NOT wait for me!¡± She said, frantically looking around, likely trying to find Mike who we thought had been next to her. I followed her orders, even though I didn¡¯t like them, since this was most definitely not the time to question the chain of command, so I quickly placed a little Fae on my shoulder and booked it in the general direction of our pod, according to the barebones digital map Mike had provided. It didn¡¯t take long before we encountered the first Guardians rushing in our direction. Well, shit. Here we go again. I sized up the creature rushing towards us without slowing down. Our previous encounter had told me a head-on collision wouldn¡¯t work out as well for me as I would have normally expected, especially since I had a passenger this time. So, I aimed to charge at it and juke to the side at the last moment to slip past it, only when we finally reached each other¡­ It juked to the side and slipped past me. Huh? It took a conscious effort not to stumble at how weirdly and quickly the situation was reversed, and, since apparently that thing hadn¡¯t planned to stop me, I just kept going to our destination unimpeded. This chain of events repeated itself nearly every time we ran into and past one of the Guardians. Occasionally one would try to take a swing at me as it passed by but they were easily shrugged off and then we each were on our way. For the life of me, I could not figure out why these creatures that had chased us so relentlessly just yesterday were now letting us do as we pleased but I didn¡¯t have time to think too deeply into it. Eventually we made it to the pod, and I quickly threw Fae in there, and then¡­ I waited. Even though I had specifically been told not to. I had already lost enough people for one day, so even though standard protocol was to seal the hatch and only open it in the event that it is safe to do so and there is one or more friendlies on the other side, or jettison the pod into space to be picked up by a shuttle or fall into the planet in the event that that doesn¡¯t happen, I instead sat in front of the closed but unlocked hatch and took it upon myself to keep the few creatures that cared about us away. At the very least, I had some shit to work through, and more than enough helpful volunteers. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALICE LANE SPEC: XENOBIOLOGIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
Everything hurt, everything itched, everything spun around me, everything was dark, but above all, everything was wrong. ¡°Mike! Sarah! Anyone, come out fast, we¡¯ve got incoming!¡± I could vaguely hear the muted calls of our captain on the other side of the rubble that surrounded me. I tried to clear it, to emerge from my underground prison like some weird giant cicada, but every movement just felt wrong. My arms were too long, and so were my feet, and something weird kept getting caught in my back. ¡°Curt! Sarah! There you are! Have any of you seen Alice?!¡± She said, although I couldn¡¯t hear a response to her question. They must have been further away. ¡°Here¡­¡± I weakly called out, grabbing Chloe¡¯s attention, who noticed me not far from where she was standing, and after a quick curse started digging me out. I don¡¯t think I¡¯ve ever been as happy to simply be able to breathe properly, but when the air that entered my lungs came without dirt or slime, it was like my body was instantly revitalized, and with some help I quickly finished digging myself out of my hole. Finally free, I took a look at the people around me. It was not a pretty sight. The captain was covered in cuts and scrapes, moved favoring her right leg and despite the tension in her posture, her arms hung limply by her side when not in active use, and behind her, although a good distance away were¡­ Guardians. Two of them. I almost jumped in surprise, but a closer look showed one of them struggling to find its balance while helping the other ¨Cwho was doing much worse, with its limbs getting tangled as it moved and those writhing, flailing things at her back getting in her own way when she tried to move¨C was leaning on the first as she tried desperately to stay upright. I guess those must be Sarah and Curt, but then¡­ ¡°Where¡¯s Mike?¡± I asked the question that was on my mind and the captain visibly deflated. ¡°Haven¡¯t found him yet,¡± She said ¡°but he can¡¯t have ended up too far from where I landed, keep looking.¡± She finished with an order, and after about a minute of searching, I found him, half buried with a bloody forehead but blissfully unconscious and still breathing. Normally, I wouldn¡¯t want to move him but this wasn¡¯t exactly a normal situation, so I started by calling out my finding and beginning the process of digging him out. ¡°Here!¡± I yelled, and the captain quickly came in and checked his pulse and breathing. When she was satisfied and he had been extracted from the rubble, she made to pull him over her shoulder and get going away from the wreckage, but quickly stumbled and fell to her knees, being careful not to hurt Mike any more than he already was in the process, and getting some more scrapes for her trouble. ¡°Fuck! My leg¡­ Anyone else feel up to carrying him?¡± She asked, and was met with silence, as Curt was still busy helping Sarah amble along, and I was still coming to grips with this entire situation. ¡°Right now, people! we¡¯re getting surrounded by the minute!¡± She said, and I looked around. It was true. Everywhere I looked, I could see more and more Guardians coming in, but instead of charging us, they immediately got to work on digging holes into the rubble coating the floor. A welcome distraction from us, but there was no telling how long it would last. ¡°I can try¡­¡± I said, and as the captain made room, I went to grab Mike and place him over my shoulders and along my back. It was surprisingly easy, and once he was on, he felt strangely secure, but now was no time to question why that was, as Chloe quickly reminded us. ¡°Everybody good? Then move it! We have a home to get to, there will be time to panic later!¡± She said, looking at Sarah, who was still trying to get her breathing under control and failing to stand by herself. She quickly got a hold of herself as best she could, and then we were off, still being largely ignored by the many Guardians that surrounded us. This wouldn¡¯t last, however, as what started with them giving us a side-eye before moving on to whatever more important things they had to deal with eventually evolved into attempting to tug us back towards the site where the bombs had gone off, and making dangerous swipes at an unarmed and injured captain. What¡¯s more, it became clear that she and Sarah, who still struggled to move properly, were holding us back, and we were moving much slower than we normally would have. As more and more of the creatures surrounding us started to take exception to our presence, the captain pulled me aside. ¡°It¡¯s a straight shot to the pod from here, get him to safety and get him treated! Now!¡± She told me. ¡°But-¡± I wanted to argue, but with an intensely yelled ¡°NOW!¡± any thought of resistance vanished and I was dashing ahead of the group with a speed that surprised even myself. A few Guardians tried to pull me back the way I had come but I shook them off, not even slowing down until I heard the sounds of gunfire and came across Alex going on a rampage. Happy to see a familiar face but not wanting to step into his line of fire, I circled around and towards our pod¡¯s hatch, catching sight of Fae inside. I smiled and gestured to the unconscious man on my shoulders as I went to open the hatch, but found it locked, and another look at Fae revealed an expression of utter terror. I was confused for a second, but only that long as the next thing I knew I had been smacked on the head hard enough to throw me off my feet, and Mike had been ripped off my back. ¡°FUCK! What-?¡± I said as I looked up and saw Alex. He opened fire. At me. The world seemed to slow down as the life ending lead screamed through the air towards me, coming from a man who had saved all of our lives many times before. The jolt of panic that went through me shocked me to my core, and before I knew it, I was dashing away, unaware and uncaring of any hits I might have taken.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
As I rounded the last corner, I had to pause and take stock of the situation, so I quickly signaled the duo behind me to wait while I investigated. Ahead of me was our pod, its hatch sealed and being defended by a screaming Alexander, his gun arm repaired and firing into the approaching creatures, while on his other arm, draped over his shoulder, was the still unconscious Mike. Alice was nowhere to be seen. ¡°Hey!¡± I yelled once I¡¯d gotten close enough and come out of hiding. He quickly turned his gun to me, but didn¡¯t fire. Thank God trigger discipline is still a thing¡­ Even now. ¡°Captain! Quick! Into the pod! We need to seal ourselves in!¡± He said, moving towards the pod and I followed, but when he stepped halfway into it, I didn¡¯t. ¡°Where¡¯s Alice?!¡± I asked over the continued sound of gunfire, noticing her conspicuous absence. The answer I got made my heart sink. ¡°Dead! Let¡¯s go!¡± In less than a second, my mind went through a million different scenarios that could have led to this situation, since I knew she had been alive and¡­ not well, but alive, and Mike¡¯s presence had to mean she¡¯d been here. All I could think of mostly boiled down to two simple possibilities: Either he doesn¡¯t know she survived after they took her¡­ Or he¡¯s done the deed himself without realizing it. After everything we¡¯ve been through in this clusterfuck of a mission, the last thing we need is panic-fueled friendly fire, not to mention how any of us is gonna deal with this going forward. Problems for later! Right now, I¡¯ve gotta ensure everyone gets home as safe as I can get them, which means going out to find her¡­ and the other two¡­ by myself since there¡¯s no way in hell I¡¯m giving a convincing explanation right now¡­ Fuck. Another second went by as I went through my options, and eventually started stepping away from the life-saving pod. ¡°I¡¯m going out scouting, stay safe and wait for evac! That¡¯s an order!¡± I strained my voice to be heard over the snarling and gunfire. ¡°Captain! That¡¯s insan-!¡± Alex tried to question me but I just booted him into the pod with an ¡°I said that¡¯s an order!¡± Having lost Alex¡¯s covering fire, I quickly turned away and made to leave before being overrun, but my attention was grabbed at the last second by a call from Fae, who had tossed me my backup spikes. Barely managing to catch the bundle of half-meter, sharp tipped polymer sticks, I turned to move away from safety to find the rest of my crew. When I was some distance away, I turned back and saw hundreds of monsters of all kinds, throwing themselves at the pod¡¯s sealed hatch. The sight was unnerving, but I knew the trio inside of it was safe, the hatch would hold. Or it wouldn¡¯t and the pod would be sent off into space, along with however many creatures managed to dislodge it. Either way, Alex, Fae and Mike would be fine. I, on the other hand, still had to reunite with the remaining crew and find our missing scientist.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+12 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
Left, right, left, right, don¡¯t forget to breathe, left, right¡­ I walked along with some difficulty, being helped by Curt who had also been tasked with following some faint trail on the ground that only he could make out in hopes that it would lead to our missing friend. The captain, who walked just slightly ahead of us, had explained her side of what had happened, letting us know that everyone else was safe, but that a reunion would be¡­ difficult. I stumbled, getting distracted by that errant thought, but with some help I managed to stop myself from falling to the ground by catching myself with my right hand and my -Don¡¯t think about those now!-. I caught a worried look from Curt but I motioned for him to focus on the task that only he could do. Eventually we found our mark. Alice was just sitting up against a wall of a random corridor with her knees tightly held in her arms, her face downcast and slightly sobbing, while her tentacles -and oh my god why does she have tentacles?!- wrapped around her legs and met back near their source on her back, completing the self-hug. It was a sight that was simultaneously unnerving, weirdly adorable and completely heartbreaking, instantly creating in everyone a need to reach out and help even despite everything that had just happened. ¡°Hey¡­¡± I said softly, kneeling in front of her. If she wanted to talk to me, she would, otherwise I would sit with her for as long as she or the situation allowed. After what felt like forever, she spoke: ¡°He shot me.¡± She said, and I could see a few small, circular wounds on her body leaking some brown liquid on the floor. ¡°What was that?¡± I asked, already not wanting an answer, but of course, I would get one. ¡°Alex. He shot me. Didn¡¯t even hesitate. Didn¡¯t even think about who I was, he just shot me.¡± I caught a wince from the captain in the background, but if Alice noticed it, she didn¡¯t let it stop her. ¡°And Fae. I barely caught a glimpse of her, but she looked¡­ Terrified. Not like she just didn¡¯t want to see me, but like she didn¡¯t want me anywhere near her.¡± After that, she sat in silence for a few seconds, before finishing: ¡°I¡¯ve been trying not to think about¡­ This.¡± She said, motioning towards her body with her eyes. ¡°But is that how it¡¯s gonna be from now on? With everyone? With all our friends and family?¡± She asked, and I had no answer I could give her. I had been grappling with the same kinds of thoughts myself, after all. Luckily for both of us, the captain chose that moment to intervene. ¡°Hey. Hey! None of that! I¡¯m still here! I¡¯m not giving up on you and I¡¯ll be damned if I let anyone else do the same, yourself included.¡± She said, crouching down to meet Alice¡¯s gaze at eye level. ¡°I promise to you that I will get you home, safe, sound, surrounded by friends, and I¡¯ll find a way to undo what¡¯s been done to you. To all of you!¡± She finished her speech, her voice radiating confidence. And yet, even to me, her promise felt¡­ Empty. I didn¡¯t doubt her ability but what she had just promised seemed completely impossible after what we had been through, and I could tell I wasn¡¯t the only one who thought that, with Curt sighing behind us and Alice looking especially unconvinced. Chloe met the biologist¡¯s sad, resigned eyes and sighed, reaching into one of her pockets and pulling out a small copper star shaped pin. ¡°I want you to have this.¡± She said, handing it to Alice, who hadn¡¯t moved from her spot since we found her. ¡°It belonged to my father. Old Army engineer for the UN, I pulled it from his ceremonial uniform when I was 11 and he was never the wiser.¡± She chuckled slightly at the start of her story, before continuing. ¡°That old bastard, it was like there was nothing he couldn¡¯t do. Every time I would need something, break something and need it fixed, or whenever I straight up wanted something, as long as it wasn¡¯t too outrageous for the child that I was, he would get it, no matter what it was. ¡°Need help with some homework? He was there and knew exactly what to do. One of my toys broke? He would have it fixed by the end of the day. Program glitching out my computer? Before I knew it, it would be banished to the digital shadow realm without losing even a single byte of data on it. Hell, to this day, I still think if I had just rolled up to him on a busted tank, he would have it pulling 120 kph by the end of the week. ¡°And every time he finished helping me with anything I asked, he would say ¡®Have I ever failed you?¡¯ and the answer would always be ¡®No¡¯. So now I ask you, Alice Lane: Have I ever failed you?¡± At hearing her name called, Alice looked up at the captain¡¯s eyes with her own, tear-filled ones. ¡°No.¡± she said softly, and the captain rallied at her words. ¡°Have I ever failed any of you?¡± She asked everyone present, and was met with another, firmer, ¡°No.¡± ¡°So, I want you to have this pin, my memory of my father, and be reassured that the promise I made to you, I intend to keep. Only when I have done that, and you are safe and sound, will I allow you to give it back to me.¡± She finished, handing over the tiny pin to Alice, who now had tears flowing freely from her eyes, yet also had a small smile on her face. ¡°So!¡± She said, standing up with a quick clap that put an end to the introspective mood. ¡°We can¡¯t just sit here forever. Curt, think you can find us a decently safe spot to rest?¡± ¡°Uhm¡­ I think so? Like the ones we¡¯ve been pitching our tents in?¡± He asked, and the captain nodded. A little while later, we were off. Chapter 7: Picking up the pieces.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
For the first time in nearly two weeks, sleep had been glorious. It had felt like all of the things that had been weighing me down simply sloughed off my shoulders while I was enveloped in a warm cocoon of safety. Like all good things, though, it eventually had to come to an end. ¡°Rise and shine, beautiful!¡± Came Curt¡¯s cheery voice. Oh Curt¡­ While I wouldn¡¯t trade him for the world, every once in a while, he had an uncanny knack for saying just the perfectly wrong thing. He still got it right more often than not, but this time, as the memories of the day before came crashing down upon my brain, was one of those times that he would have been better off not saying anything. Or, at least, that was what I¡¯d first thought. As I opened my eyes, however, I quickly reconsidered. Sitting not far from where I had passed out to rest, was Curt. Not the monster that had been made of him, not some other unrecognizable creature or even an injured version of him. Just Curt, sitting up against a wall, happy as can be. My still sleepy brain had to do a double and triple take to process what my eyes were feeding it, and before it could start doing a fourth, Alice bulldozed her way into the center of my thought process by crouching in front of my face and talking in an excited tone. ¡°Sarah! Look!¡± She said, pointing at herself, followed by Curt and then me. ¡°We¡¯re back!¡± She finished. Sure enough, she looked perfectly normal, and after a quick moment of hesitation, I looked down at my own hands. My perfectly normal, human hands. I stared in stunned silence for a quick second. Then I turned my hand around to look at its other side. It still looked normal. No wicked claws, no slimy dark green tint, just my regular old hand that I¡¯d had since the day I was born. I stood stunned for a few seconds more as my brain rebooted itself and an overwhelmingly infectious excitement started bubbling up from the pit of despair that had formed the previous day. ¡°EEEEEEE¡± I explained my excitement to the group, grabbing Alice in a tight hug while Curt just watched with a smirk, waiting for his turn. When I was done, I walked over to sit next to him and give him his own hug - one much more tender and filled with the relief we both felt - which he reciprocated. Eventually we had to separate as it became apparent that Alice¡¯s excited demeanor was shifting into something more wistful. ¡°This means we can go back to the others!¡± I said, hoping to bring the general mood back into something more cheerful. ¡°Also, we are all in agreement that the noise I made earlier never happened.¡± I joked, which finished cementing Alice¡¯s smile back onto her face. ¡°Speaking of, where¡¯s the captain?¡± She asked, her smile not faltering and no doubt thinking of showing off her restored humanity to as many people as possible. ¡°Went out to check on the pod a while ago, told me to keep watch until you woke up. Should be coming back any second.¡± Curt explained, and as if summoned by his words, Captain Chloe Paxton emerged from around a bend in the tunnel leading to where we had made camp for the night. She was met with the sight of Curt and I relaxedly cuddling into each other, and an eager Alice bouncing on her toes with a beaming smile on her face. ¡°You all look happy.¡± She said, still catching her breath, but a small smile forming on her lips. ¡°Yeah! Captain, look!¡± Alice shouted, practically giggling, pointing at herself and us. ¡°I see.¡± Was her answer, her smile becoming the slightest bit warmer. ¡°So did you manage to get to the rest of the squad?¡± Curt asked, shifting the conversation to more important matters. ¡°No joy, the place is swarming with Guardians, couldn¡¯t even get close. They were distracted before, but now they¡¯re out in force.¡± Chloe summarized her little solo expedition. ¡°So, unless someone¡¯s got a better idea, I say we find a proper hidey-hole and either wait for them to clear out of the pod, or make a racket somewhere else to drive them away. Thoughts?¡± She finished, looking pointedly at Curt, whose expertise was most relevant for the task at hand. ¡°Seems about right, though if we can¡¯t physically reach the others, then we should definitely try to at least get them on comms before we do anything.¡± He answered, and neither Alice nor I had anything to add. The captain, though, winced before delivering some bad news. ¡°About that¡­ My comms device got smashed when I fell through the ceiling of the prison, same with the location beacon and a few others, so we are on our own. Unless you still have yours¡­?¡± She trailed of her question, and when no one answered, I was the one to step up. ¡°They tore off our gear and dumped it all over the place, where would we even be holding it?¡± I asked. Her answer was just a raised eyebrow. Alice had the decency to look embarrassed while Curt just chuckled. When I finally got her implication, I could only groan. ¡°Right! So, the plan for now is to find a safe haven where the Guardians can¡¯t get to us, rest and recover before checking out the pod again, and either regroup with everyone or create a diversion if necessary. Move out!¡± Chloe ordered, back in full commanding officer mode. ¡­ The search for some sort of cave or something similar took us through many winding corridors, and our pace was fairly slow. Both because we were being extra careful to avoid patrols, and because, lacking a Navigator, we all had to make extra sure we didn¡¯t stray too far from the pod and the people we were hoping to eventually reunite with. The ubiquitous slime that seemed to cover everything in this space tree was also a factor in slowing down our pace, but after nearly two weeks of trudging through it, it wasn¡¯t nearly as annoying as it had been. After what felt like easily a few hours of walking near aimlessly, it was Alice who called out something unusual. ¡°Hey¡­ What¡¯s that over there?¡± She asked At the end of a tunnel we had almost passed by, deeming it unremarkable, was a light. That in itself wasn¡¯t anything special, this entire place was dotted with those sickly yellow glowing pustules that emerged from the walls, ceiling and floors, but what had caught her attention, and later all of ours, was that the glow wasn¡¯t the same sickly yellow but a pure, dazzling white. ¡°Dunno.¡± Answered Curt. ¡°We should probably check it out?¡± He asked the group, and the captain nodded, deferring to his expertise. When we reached the light at the end of the tunnel, the sight we were met with took all of our breath away. Nestled into the slimy depths of an alien space tree, looking entirely out of place, was a bustling city, filled with people going about their daily business, walking in and out of clean buildings, stopping at food stalls that littered the streets and emanated an absolutely tantalizing aroma, while some walked their kids to a nearby park covered in carefully trimmed grass and dotted with shade giving trees, and also equipped with a complete playground, whose climbable walls, slides and sand pits were always in use. It was a sight that contrasted so completely with everything we¡¯d seen up until that point, that it drove all of us into stunned silence. Eventually, I was the first to break it. ¡°It¡¯s beautiful.¡± I spoke with no small amount of reverence in my voice, and looking at the others, it seemed they shared my opinion of this place. I was about to turn around to glance at Chloe¡¯s expression, when my whole world suddenly spun. O??????W?????? [DATA CORRUPTED] A painfully hard smack to the back of my head drove me to my knees, where an uncomfortable amount of vomit came rushing to escape my mouth and fall in front of my face. Its smell on the ground was only eclipsed by my sheer confusion on what the hell was going on. ¡°Captain, what the hell?!¡± I heard Curt¡¯s voice on my side, followed by his footsteps moving behind me while Alice came to my side to check on me. ¡°Anyone else think this is in any way beautiful?!¡± She asked with fiery venom in her words. The sheer intensity of them left Curt and Alice stunned, and as I turned around, I saw her brandishing one of her sharp polymer sticks pointed just a few centimeters away from Curt¡¯s throat. After a while of not receiving an answer, she put it down with a sharp ¡°Fuck!¡± coming out of her mouth, and tensions eased, though didn¡¯t disappear, as Curt came down to check on me and Chloe seemingly lost herself in her own thoughts while still keeping an eye on the three of us. Slowly I got back to my feet, their wobbliness quickly fading away and I could stand without help. As I gathered my thoughts, I went to ask the question that was on all of our minds. ¡°Captain, what was th-?¡± ¡°OKAY!¡± She interrupted me. ¡°We need to find a safe spot, and we need one RIGHT NOW! Once we know we are safe, we can talk about what the hell is going on¡­¡± She ordered with an intensity only seen in times of crisis, but lost her energy and her words trailed off. A few seconds later, she recovered. ¡°Fuck me¡­ We need to split up and find a spot as quickly as possible. Look around, but stay safe, and we¡¯ll reconvene here in an hour. Understood?¡± She asked, and was met only with stunned silence. ¡°Well, if you¡¯ve nothing to say, get to it! Time¡¯s wastin¡¯!¡± She ordered, and we all took off in different directions, but with the same doubts in our minds, our image of the ever-reliable Captain Paxton contrasting heavily with the almost manic energy she had just shown. Whatever was going on with her, it wasn¡¯t normal.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: FAE MALLORY SPEC: ENGINEER
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°So, you think they¡¯re gonna get tired sometime today, or¡­?¡± I asked the two who were stuck in the pod with me. The creatures at the gate were still throwing themselves against it, but the airlock held on with no signs of damage. This had been going on since Alex was unceremoniously booted into the pod by Chloe, who took off immediately after, forcing me to lock the door before something could jump at us. The number of monsters outside had only grown since then, but more and more seemed to give up as time passed, taking a rest before walking off. Most they can do is knock the pod into open space, and all that would accomplish would be killing themselves as their atmosphere vented and likely sucked them into the unforgiving void. ¡°Dunno about today, but they definitely seem to be getting lazier.¡± Opined Alex, looking out the window of the airlock beside me. Mike, meanwhile, continued to sulk in his sulking corner. ¡°We might be able to go out later today or tomorrow.¡± Alex voiced his thoughts, making Mike twitch. ¡°Okay, we¡¯ve got to talk about this. What¡¯s eating you up?¡± I finally asked. ¡°You know, for someone so small, you¡¯re subtle as a sledgehammer.¡± Alex whispered to me, but I just shushed him. ¡°I don¡¯t know¡­¡± Mike said in a soft voice, not even looking up. Well that¡¯s fuckin¡¯ helpful¡­ ¡°Think you can take this one?¡± I whispered to Alex. He just shrugged and raised his hands while shaking his head with an unsure expression, and I tilted my head in Mike¡¯s direction. He sighed, and walked up to the sulking corner. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator. ¡°Hey, buddy. Talk to me.¡± He said as he sat down. ¡°I genuinely don¡¯t know. I keep trying to recall what happened since we were dragged off but¡­¡± Mike began but trailed off after a few seconds. ¡°It¡¯s been such a nightmare that I can¡¯t even tell what¡¯s real and what¡¯s not.¡± ¡°Shit, it really was.¡± Alex answered. ¡°You do know that none of us blames you for what happened, right? And if everyone else were still around, they wouldn¡¯t either.¡± He finished, placing a large, comforting hand ¨C the organic one ¨C on the smaller man¡¯s shoulder. ¡°That¡¯s¡­ not the problem, though¡­¡± He spoke, his voice nearly a whisper, and a shiver seemed to shake him from head to toe. ¡°They¡¯re still out there¡­ I think¡­ but-¡± ¡°You think, or you know?¡± Alex asked far more intensely than the situation called for. Aaaand there goes that plan¡­ ¡°Y¡¯know, the captain might have said something similar, before she kicked your ass.¡± I interjected before the conversation could be derailed by Alex¡¯s impotent rage. As someone whose entire job was to keep everyone safe, even going so far as to modify his own body to be better suited to the task, this colossal failure was hitting him especially hard. That said, I was aware that showing him pity would only make things worse, so I defaulted to trying to get him to laugh. ¡°Hmph.¡± He chuckled, making room for me to sit with him in front of Mike. Success! I mentally cheered myself while trying to come up with a way to navigate this landmine of a conversation. Damnit, Mike! You¡¯re supposed to be the Navigator here, so navigate this! ¡°What do you remember? Even if you¡¯re not sure if it really happened or not, it¡¯s better than nothing.¡± I eventually asked. ¡°I¡­ Well, they took us to some big chamber above the prison cells, and they had them there¡­ Alice, Sarah and Curt, but¡­ Shit was fucked.¡± He finished saying with a sad chuckle. Oh god, the captain got to him, I guess we¡¯re not getting anything out of him after all. ¡°They were holding them, but¡­ They were in pieces. Even if they tried to move, it would all just be wrong, and all the while some huge pillslug dinosaur was probing their brains.¡± Alex and I were stunned from hearing his words, but he wasn¡¯t done. ¡°Next thing I know, the floor blew up and I passed out. I kept waking up and passing out after that, so everything¡¯s hazy, but¡­ I couldn¡¯t move, couldn¡¯t see, couldn¡¯t breathe, but everything was shaking, and my entire body felt slick with sweat and gunk. It was like I was tied up and being dragged behind a horse, if that horse was running along the bottom of the ocean. The next thing I remember is waking up here.¡± Alex and I shared an incredulous glance at each other. Well shit, maybe the captain didn¡¯t get to him but that still doesn¡¯t help. After a long while, it was Alex that broke the silence. ¡°You think they still have them like that?¡± He said, and Mike flinched. And I¡¯m the one who¡¯s as subtle as a sledgehammer? ¡°You¡¯re thinking they might still be alive?¡± I asked the pair, hoping to salvage his question. ¡°Chloe did come in asking after Alice.¡± Alex commented and, for the first time since we locked ourselves in the pod, Mike perked up. ¡°So, we¡¯re gonna go find them, right?¡± Mike asked uncharacteristically excited, his sullen mood and usual apprehension towards rushing into danger seemingly forgotten. ¡°At the very least, Captain Chloe is definitely still out there, so we should find her and see if she can fill us in on the situation.¡± Alex said in an attempt to temper Mike¡¯s unusual excitement. ¡°Then let¡¯s go!¡± He yelled, walking up to the airlock, and showing that Alex¡¯s attempt had failed miserably. ¡°Just as soon as the nightmare horde moves away from the door.¡± I playfully added, causing Mike to shrink back in on himself with a muttered ¡°Oh¡­¡± Not ideal, but better than him rushing out and getting himself killed. Speaking of¡­ ¡°So, I¡¯m all for this idea, but shouldn¡¯t we maybe wait for the rescue party to reach us first?¡± I asked the group before we all decided to do something stupid. ¡°Normally I¡¯d say yes, but we know at least one of us is out there and in danger, so we have to find her as soon as possible. If the rescue party doesn¡¯t reach us first, they should have some good maps and can track our beacons, isn¡¯t that right, Mike?¡± Alex was the first to answer, finishing with another question for Mike. ¡°True, but then the problem becomes getting back to the shuttle with a big group, no shot we can sneak that many people past all the guards.¡± ¡°We¡¯ll figure it out once we¡¯ve met up with everyone and can take stock of the situation, let¡¯s go!¡± Alex ordered, seemingly putting himself in charge of our little trio, meaning he was just begging for me to rain on his literal parade. ¡°Did you forget what I said about the nightmare horde?¡± I asked with a smirk. ¡°Right, so we hurry up and wait! Let¡¯s go!¡± He said with the same intensity as before, not missing a beat, before plopping his ass dramatically on a seat with a serious face that changed into a smile after a few seconds.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
Disgusting¡­ That single word occupied all of my thoughts as I scaled the outside of one of the slimy pillars littered with caves that reached all the way to the ceiling of the large cavern we had walked into, spitting in the face of this tree¡¯s admittedly weak-ish gravity in a way that would make Fae proud. Disgusting¡­ I was reminded as my grasping hand found a particularly soft and slippery spot on the wall that would not be able to act as a proper handhold. It wasn¡¯t just the environment that I found so revolting, however. I was also thinking about my previous actions towards Sarah¡­ And especially what had caused them. Not even a day after I made that huge promise, too. As we¡¯d stepped into the cavernous space and got a good look at the tall pillars that reached the ceiling and bustled with activity, the three of them had stopped. That had been weird. Sure, the whole setup was impressive, in the same way that seeing the cast of an anthill is impressive, but it mostly wasn¡¯t anything we hadn¡¯t seen before in our time here. Something that set this scene apart from the many open cave like spaces we¡¯d seen before was how much this location bustled with activity, with thousands upon thousands of pillslugs moving up and down the columns that reached all the way to the distant ceiling as well as along the ground in the spaces between those columns. Worse was the fact that a solid chunk of them was carrying some sort of unidentifiable material, while several others were moving what were very clearly body parts of both pillslugs and Guardians. How any sane person, let alone Sarah who I¡¯d known for years, could look at this scene and call it beautiful was beyond me¡­ What I found truly sickening, however, was not her words or even her face, both filled with awe, but the back of her head, and the thing that was there. Just underneath her now slimy skin, in a spot where the only muscles that should be there were those holding up the head, was something small, twitching. It might have even been me freaking out at first noticing, but I could swear I saw it burrowing into her head from the back of her neck. Utterly disturbed, I had to keep away my rising panic attack by smacking the shit out of whatever the hell that was, which caused Sarah to fall on her knees and let out an ungodly stream of vomit. I tried to question the others to see if they were going through something similar, but in my nearly panicked state¡­ Something tells me they didn¡¯t get my meaning¡­ And I just sent them away unsupervised. Stellar captaining¡­ Nauseated once again, I decided I had gone far enough in my climb up the pillar and climbed into the nearest cave entrance, the words of my promise that Dad used to say to me echoing in my head. ¡®Have I ever failed you?¡¯ Of course, what I didn¡¯t tell them when I made that promise is that Dad did eventually fail me, but by that point I was already old enough to understand that people are fallible. This, though, was not the promise I wanted to make that fact evident with, so, resting in the mouth of the little pillar-side cave, I settled to take stock of the situation. First, the party is split, half of it should be safe as long as they stay in the pod, while we are currently looking for a safe spot to truly rest. Second, the rescue party should be on their way, likely tracking our beacons¡­ which we don¡¯t have. So they should meet with the other group before coming for us. If they even do that. Assume they will. Third, there¡¯s something weird going on with their heads. As far as I can tell they are still acting normal, but then they go and call something they¡¯d found gross two days earlier beautiful¡­ Physically, Sarah, Curt and Alice were barely recognizable, though their features shone through when they started talking. In broad strokes, they looked mostly humanoid, slightly taller than they had been, with longer arms, digitigrade legs, beady eyes and the whole package of wickedly sharp claws and fangs, hairless slimy skin of a mottled dark green and flailing tentacles with an underside covered in myriad insect legs that all Guardians seemed to have¡­ Which pointed to a disturbing origin of those Guardians. Their behavior, though was¡­ weirdly normal, for lack of a better word. Someone talking to them on a phone wouldn¡¯t be able to tell anything was wrong, and while they struggled at first to find their footing, their movements are now as fluid as though they¡¯ve had their twisted bodies their whole lives¡­ Which is worrying in and of itself. Alice would be the one to ask whether such rapid adaptation to an unfamiliar body structure should even be possible, but given that she¡¯s also the subject of that question, asking it becomes a little more complicated. That said, Alice was the one who seemed to most quickly get the hang of her altered body, being able to move without help from the moment she was released and even carry Mike on her back while sprinting with surprising speed. She had six of those weird tentacles sticking out of her back and they seemed to behave as though they were any other limb, working interchangeably with her actual hands, evidenced by how she had used all of them to hug her knees the night prior. A quirk she¡¯d acquired since her capture was that she would occasionally switch from walking upright like normal to doing so on all fours for brief periods, most notably during her mad sprint to the pod with Mike upon her back. Whether all this is because of her familiarity with other body types as a biologist or something else, I¡¯m not sure I wanna know. Sarah, on the other hand, was probably the one most shaken by this ordeal. The first night, she had struggled to even walk by herself, with her four tentacles dragging limply along the floor behind her. She¡¯d since recovered somewhat, able to move with the twisted form of grace that her new body allowed, but mentally, there was no telling what¡¯s truly going on with her¡­ And that hit I gave her probably didn¡¯t help. I¡¯ll have to check with her or more likely Curt to see how she¡¯s holding up. Finally, there was Curt, dare I say the most normal of our little group, for however much that word even applied. With only two tentacles protruding from his back and a barely altered gait, he¡¯d been a reliable rock for the rest of this little portion of the team, myself included. He didn¡¯t have as many tentacles poking out of his back as the other two, however the pair he did have seemed to have a mind of their own, constantly flailing around and feeling up and down along the walls, I¡¯d even had to duck under their wild swings a few times. I¡¯d chosen to take it as a sign of him being alert, but then started to doubt that was the only reason after my latest freakout. And then, there was me, the valiant captain supposed to lead the group to safety and always have a plan to reliably get through even the toughest situations, and at the moment, that plan was exceedingly simple: I¡¯unn¡¯fuckin¡¯kno¡¯ I lost control of this situation two days ago! Truthfully, this wasn¡¯t even the first time this happened, but all those other times I¡¯d been able to fall back on that supposedly ¡®crazy deathworlder strength¡¯ to muscle my way to my goals. I may be a master at bullshitting my way through problems, but this didn¡¯t seem like one where that particular skill applied. With a groan, I got up from my seated position and made to explore deeper into the random column-side cave, but quickly came across a problem, in the form of two pillslugs that had apparently claimed it before me. If Goober is anything to go by, they might get me right back into that whole prison mess, so¡­ So much for ¡®Do not the weird aliens¡¯.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
A while after our spat with Chloe, we had all gone our separate ways. She¡¯d made sure all of us were far apart from each other before taking off herself, so, utterly alone and not feeling up to looking for whatever passed for a ¡®safe hiding spot¡¯, I decided to go exploring, which led to my current situation, sitting next to an ice cream stand manned by a kindly old man who had insisted on giving me a generously sized free sample. Suddenly, without any warning that I could notice or remember, I felt something. Calling the feeling strange would have been an understatement, as I suddenly felt an overwhelming, all-consuming need to look there, at what might be the sixth or seventh floor of an apartment building, and my head almost seemed to turn to face it without any input from myself. As quickly as it appeared, however, that feeling was gone, and in its place was only the vague curiosity pointing me to try and find out what the hell had that been. So, I said my goodbyes to the ice cream seller and went to investigate. Walking up to the base of the apartment building, the doorman let me in without a fuss. I didn¡¯t even need to explain what I was doing there. One quick elevator ride and I was there, faced with the door to the apartment that had yanked my attention away from my little ice cream cone without a warning. The door was slightly ajar and a faint shuffling could be heard from inside. I opened the door as quietly as I could, resolving to sneak into what looked like a two-bedroom apartment to gauge the situation. I¡¯d thought I was being slick, but a fast movement in the corner of my eyes and a small prick in the side of my neck quickly disillusioned me. It was all I could do not to jump back when I felt the sharp tip of the captain¡¯s polymer baton digging just the tiniest bit into the skin of my neck. ¡°Oh, it¡¯s you¡­¡± She said, her voice completely devoid of emotions as she withdrew her weapon from the most vulnerable spot on my body, the events of not even an hour ago rushing back to the forefront of my mind. ¡°Jee-sus!¡± I said, drawing out the word to make my displeasure known. ¡°Captain, what the hell was that fo- Why are you covered in blood?¡± I began to ask a question but quickly had to backpedal and ask another, much more important one. ¡°Oh, this? Don¡¯t worry, it¡¯s not mine.¡± Was her answer, as if that had been all that was needed. ¡°Were you followed?¡± She then asked. ¡°Followed? Why would anyone follow me? You told us to split up, remem-?¡± I started asking, but she cut me off. ¡°Look, Sarah, this is important.¡± She started, and I gulped. Between her earlier hit to my neck and now finding her soaked in blood, that was apparently not hers, in some random apartment, there was definitely something weird going on. ¡°I need you to look around this place, and describe exactly what you see.¡± She told me. So confused that my fight or flight response had looped back around to land perfectly in the middle at ¡®calmly stand still¡¯, I did as she asked. The two-bedroom apartment was a cozy place, with clean wooden furniture, fresh flowers and framed pictures that made it seem lived in, and then there was the captain, who looked entirely out of place as though she¡¯d walked right out of a horror movie. Not far behind her, I could see a puddle of blood slowly growing out of the doorway to what was presumably the apartment¡¯s kitchen, and walking over to get a closer look, I was greeted to the sight of an old couple, roughly in their sixties, both lying on the floor with circular holes in their chests. Chapter 8: The pieces don’t fit.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
¡°What did you do?!¡± I asked in shock at the sight of the two corpses before me. ¡°What¡¯s it look like?¡± She answered, completely unrepentant, and I was almost stunned all over again. ¡°What do you mean ¡®what¡¯s it look like¡¯?! Those poor people!¡± I yelled, pointing at the obvious murder victims, hoping for the captain to somehow give a reasonable explanation for what the hell had happened here. ¡°¡¯People¡¯? Sarah, seriously, I need you to tell me what you¡¯re seeing!¡± Was her response, dashing my hopes yet again. Between how she¡¯d randomly attacked me while my back was turned, how she had almost cursed everyone out immediately after, then told us to separate, and how she now had straight up murdered two people who couldn¡¯t have put up much of a fight even if they¡¯d tried, my earlier suspicions of something being seriously wrong with her were all but confirmed, and I knew she couldn¡¯t be allowed to just continue to do as she pleased, captain or no. Even still, I couldn¡¯t think of a good way to deal with this situation, as for years I¡¯d gotten front row seats to her ass-kicking sessions with the boys, so I genuinely doubted I could stop her without going the way of the old couple currently laying on the floor in front of me. Then again, that had always been a part of why I¡¯d had nothing but respect for Chloe, always the reliable pillar of strength and direction for our group that somehow never failed to get everyone to do their proper jobs as a unit that was more than the sum of its parts. I decided to try and talk her down before things could get more out of control. ¡°Paxton¡­¡± I spat, using her last name instead of her first name or rank as a show of my building annoyance and dwindling respect for her. ¡°How could you?¡± I finished by accusing her. ¡°How could I what? Sarah, I need you to answer that. Right. Now.¡± She spoke, a threatening edge to her words, and I almost lost it. ¡°You broke into someone¡¯s house and murdered them! This old couple were probably minding their own business and you just killed them!¡± I yelled. ¡°¡¯Broke into someone¡¯s house¡¯? ¡®Old couple¡¯? Sarah, these are pillslugs.¡± She tried to explain, although it was plain to see she was clearly lying. ¡°Are you fucking with me right now?! Those are clearly people you just-!¡± I started screaming with all the force that my lungs could muster, but was abruptly stopped by her polymer stick being placed right back just a hair¡¯s breadth away from my neck before I could even blink. ¡°I need you to calm down, and think for a bit.¡± She said, only making me angrier. No way she thinks she can put me in time out right now! ¡°Where do you think we are?¡± She asked, like it wasn¡¯t the most obvious thing that could be inferred by looking at anything in our surroundings. ¡°A two-bedroom apartment.¡± I said, and she just looked surprised. ¡°That likely belonged to the people you just murdered.¡± I finished, an accusing venom coating my words. ¡°¡­Okay?¡± She began hesitantly, before continuing with more certainty. ¡°And where is this two-bedroom apartment?¡± Is she taking the piss right now? ¡°What does that have to do with anything?!¡± I asked her, but she barely even reacted. ¡°Answer.¡± She ordered with finality. I wanted to scream her head off, but the weapon that was almost pressed against my throat made me reconsider. Instead, I tried to think of a way to get her to step back, so I could then see what I could do to get this fucked up situation under control. As if this whole trip hadn¡¯t been enough of a fuck-up, now I have to deal with this. There was some detail nagging me about that last thought, but I had to push it aside in favor of getting shit done. ¡®Where is this two-bedroom apartment?¡¯ Obviously, the answer was in a little town where a nice ice cream seller had given me a free sample, although for the life of me I couldn¡¯t remember its name. Weird, but I had other things to think about right then. ¡°You mean the little town just outside?¡± I asked, hoping that that answer would be enough. ¡°And where is this town?¡± She doubled down on asking stupid questions. Or at least, they seemed like stupid questions until I started actually thinking about them, as, much like had happened with the town before it, the name of the country we were in escaped me. Same thing happened with the name of the continent and even the planet¡­ Wait, no¡­ I could actually remember the planet we were in, or more accurately in orbit of. It was one that had been thought to have no sapient beings, until someone, suddenly and somehow launched a tree into orbit from it. And we¡¯d been sent to explore that tree. I stumbled back as the events of the last few days came rushing back to the forefront of my mind. The captain allowed this and did not pursue. It just didn¡¯t make any sense, we had been in orbit of an alien planet that shouldn¡¯t have any people to be murdered, let alone humans! Yet I was clearly looking at the deceased bodies of two of them. ¡°But¡­ How did they get¡­ here?¡± I asked weakly in confusion. ¡°They¡¯ve been here the whole time.¡± She answered almost nonchalantly. ¡°Like I said, they¡¯re pillslugs.¡± ¡°No, they¡¯re not!¡± I said, her words clashing with the reality before me. Yet at the same time, I had to face the fact that it didn¡¯t make sense for us to have spent weeks exploring this place finding nothing but the expected locals, and then suddenly we stumbled upon a whole town filled with nothing but humans, and none of them even commented about how they¡¯d spent all this time in a space tree. Not even I did¡­ In hindsight, it was weird how I didn¡¯t think about this sooner, but that train of thought led in a direction that made me deeply uncomfortable. ¡°Do they look like people to you?¡± Chloe asked and I reluctantly nodded in the affirmative. ¡°Shit.¡± She said, eloquently as ever, but her meaning was clear. Shit¡­ Yet, even as my thoughts echoed her, I still had to ask, for the sake of what was left of my sanity. ¡°¡­what shit?¡± I asked weakly, and when she answered, I immediately wished I hadn¡¯t. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure they¡¯re messing with your heads, literally changing the way you see things.¡± She answered, and a gaping pit of dread instantly formed in my stomach. How could I not notice this before? What¡¯s been real this whole time? Did I do anything I¡¯d wish I hadn¡¯t because I literally couldn¡¯t tell I was doing it? Worse yet, how will I be able to tell what¡¯s what from now on?! Everything looks so normal I hadn¡¯t even bothered to think it might not be! Is this gonna be my life from now on? ¡°Hey! HEY! Look at me!¡± The captain said, getting her face right in front of mine, likely having noticed my spiraling thoughts written all over my face. The surprise would have made me jump had it not been for my shock that left me stunned. I also realized she had tossed her weapon some distance away and was now completely unarmed, this one action turning her intimidating presence from earlier into a comforting one. ¡°What do I look like?¡± She asked. I had to quickly stop myself from complaining about her asking stupid questions again, her previous set having led to a world-shattering revelation for me, so I answered honestly. ¡°Like¡­ you? Captain Chloe.¡± I said, and she smiled. ¡°And do you remember what I promised you?¡± She asked me, clearly referring to that moment right after our escape. ¡°That you¡¯d get us home?¡± I asked her. ¡°Right, that I¡¯d get you and everyone else in our little squad home, safe and sound! And does it look like this changes anything about this promise?¡± She asked me, rising up from where she¡¯d sat with me at some point. ¡°Yes?¡± I answered honestly. A frown formed on her face, but quickly eased into a sad smile. ¡°No¡± she said with finality. ¡°It most definitely does not.¡± ¡°But how can we get back home safe if we can¡¯t even tell what¡¯s real from what¡¯s not?¡± I pleaded before finishing in a much lower voice. ¡°If we can¡¯t even know if our minds are our own¡­¡± ¡°Simple, despite what it looks like, do you really think I could just murder random people I run into?¡± She asked and I shook my head. ¡°Do you really think this space tree could have randomly been colonized entirely by humans overnight?¡± I shook my head again. ¡°And most importantly, who are you?¡± I shook my head on reflex before looking up in confusion. ¡°I said: who are you?¡± She reiterated, as if trying to drive some point home. ¡°Sarah Di Pietro?¡± I answered, unsure where she was going with this. ¡°That¡¯s right, you are one of the smartest people I know! Some vivid hallucination is definitely not enough to keep you down!¡± She told me, and despite how cheesy the comment had been, it did cheer me up. After all, with what she¡¯d just said, she¡¯d turned one of my fears into a strength¡­ sort of. Maybe this is gonna be my life from now on, constantly seeing things for what they are not, but¡­ these ¡®hallucinations¡¯ have stayed weirdly consistent, so much so that I didn¡¯t even notice them until they were pointed out. That means that, if I always see the pillslugs and their structures as if they were human, then¡­ As long as I have people I can trust and that are willing to work with me, then¡­ I should be fine. Right? Although then again, this was definitely ignoring one huge elephant in the room. ¡°But what if it gets worse? What if I suddenly can¡¯t tell what¡¯s real from what¡¯s not and not even notice?¡± I asked her, but she just shrugged it off. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that, I already took care of it.¡± She said, utterly unconcerned. Uuuuhm, what? ¡°What?¡± I asked her. ¡°How? When?!¡± ¡°What¡¯s my biggest talent?¡± She asked with a grin, and despite her being a woman of many talents, a certain one quickly came to mind. ¡°Smacking the shit out of something until it stops being a problem?¡± I asked with a hint of a tease driven by my recovering mood. ¡°That¡¯s right! And do you think I would just randomly whack you in the back of the head hard enough to make you double over for no reason in particular?¡± She said, and it was all I could do to stop myself from going slack-jawed. Has she known since back then? ¡°Right, so, I saw something weird on the back of your neck and then you started acting weird, so I smacked it, and you should be all good for now, I think!¡± She said with a smile and a thumbs up, but it didn¡¯t take a doctor to point out her dubious reasoning. ¡°You think or you know?¡± I asked her, and she quickly snapped an answer: ¡°Look, nobody¡¯s perfect.¡± At that, I couldn¡¯t help myself, I just snorted. Her explanation wasn¡¯t as reassuring as I¡¯d like but I¡¯d take what I could get, and it was nothing next to the reminder that her promise still stood even after all that had happened. So, with a heavy heart but comforted in the knowledge that I wasn¡¯t alone, I turned to the future. ¡°So, what now?¡± I asked her, to which she just shrugged. ¡°Regroup and recover.¡± She answered simply, like it was the most obvious thing ever. ¡°Yeah, but¡­ How? The first one, I mean.¡± I asked and quickly clarified in case she decided to give me a smartass response that would make Curt proud. Of course, I was a fool for thinking that would be enough to stop her. ¡°What did I tell you like two seconds ago?¡± She said, clearly referring to the ¡®Nobody¡¯s perfect¡¯ comment. It took a conscious effort of will to maintain an unamused expression long enough to get a serious answer. ¡°We have a decent vantage point from here, we can use it to spot anything that looks like it¡¯s coming for us before the hour limit has passed, be that Curt or Alice or something else. If we see them, one of us can go get them, if we see something dangerous, we move out before it gets here. Otherwise, we rest until our agreed upon time and go find them at our rendezvous point.¡± ¡°Okay, but why did we even get separated in the first place?¡± I pointed out. The plan seemed solid enough but clearly, we would have been better off sticking together, as evidenced by the current situation where we couldn¡¯t know what half of our group was up to. ¡°I¡­ ¡®m sorry.¡± The captain apologized instead of answering. ¡°What for?¡± I wanted to say besides nearly knocking me out without warning earlier, but after our little heart-to-heart it seemed uncalled for. ¡°Truth is¡­ I was freaking out¡­ when I saw the thing that I hit¡­ on your neck.¡± She explained, and I frowned. At this point I was aware that we didn¡¯t actually look like we thought we did, but did she really find us so disgusting as to drive her to freak out so much as to lash out and make bad decisions? I didn¡¯t get to bring it up before she continued: ¡°When I saw it and you started acting all weird, I was¡­ Well, I already told you it freaked me out, but more than that, I was worried that there may still be something happening to you, and I started panicking because I didn¡¯t know what to do about it. So¡­ yeah¡­ I didn¡¯t want to tell you because I was trying to be all reassuring but, well, there you go.¡± She finished in an uncharacteristic moment of vulnerability. I was surprised that she would be so open, both about our situation as well as the things she was doing to deal with it, but more than that, I was surprised that I could get it. After all, I had been freaking out and about to make some bad decisions myself, and the despair I had almost fallen in immediately after had kept me from seeing that even people who weren¡¯t in my situation could still be affected by it just as much, even if in a different way. It was a sobering realization but it also gave more meaning to her promise to stand by us in spite of everything. ¡°Don¡¯t be.¡± I told her. ¡°What?¡± She asked, looking up at me from the spot on the floor she¡¯d been staring at for the last five seconds. ¡°Don¡¯t be sorry.¡± I clarified. ¡°You were doing the best you could in the situation. It just so happens that the situation was shit, but still, we¡¯re alright, we¡¯re all alive, as we always are in the end, and that¡¯s in no small part because of you, so don¡¯t be sorry.¡± ¡°Right.¡± She spoke. ¡°I guess our best is all we can do. Thank you, Sarah.¡± And with that, we settled to wait while keeping an eye on the streets below, even if I had to remind myself they weren¡¯t actually streets.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALEXANDER BELMONT SPEC: GUNNER
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
FLAGGED FOR (1 MAJOR) BREACH OF PROTOCOL DURING A MISSION
IMMEDIATE REVIEW BY S.O. RECOMMENDED BEFORE DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS ARE DECIDED
¡®Approaching intersect point in fifty meters, confirm.¡¯ Came the voice of Billy Carter, our crew¡¯s other navigator alongside Mike, and sub-captain like Curt. We¡¯d left the pod after the swarm of Guardians had cleared out and were on our way through the tree¡¯s labyrinthine tunnels to meet the rescue team halfway between our pod and their shuttle. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. Given his rank, Billy had naturally been assigned to lead the rescue effort, aided by the maps that Mike had crafted along the way and beamed to our ship, as well as our Nav-Beacons they could use to track our locations. We might have had our differences with him and ¡®his side¡¯ of the crew, but we all understood that this was no time for petty personal conflicts, and any one of us would put our life on the line if it was needed to help any other. ¡°Approaching intersect, seventy meters away and past a bend on our end.¡± I spoke into my communicator. The signal was choppy at best, the weirdly conductive slime coating everything everywhere wreaking havoc on the signal¡¯s quality, but I didn¡¯t let any of this get me down. Just a few more minutes and we¡¯d get to the spot where the tunnel we were walking down merged with theirs, and then we could regroup and figure out a way to reunite with the captain. Or just escape with our lives¡­ I quickly banished the completely unacceptable thought, no way in hell we were leaving someone behind. ¡®How are you holding up?¡¯ Carter asked through our comms, apparently not in a mood to give us shit, right now. I, however, was, if only to take the edge off the minds of the pair behind me. ¡°Doing great, man. Everything is totally tubular!¡± I spoke with a forced grin. ¡°Fuck you.¡± That last was said both by the man I was talking to through my comms, as well as the pair following behind me, but I could still spot the slight upturning of the edges of Fae¡¯s mouth and Mike¡¯s expression betrayed the slightest unclenching of his sphincter, so I¡¯d call that a success. ¡®Twenty meters to the rendezvous point.¡¯ Carter said, sounding ever so slightly more tired than before, another reason to call that previous joke a success. If he could sigh at my cringeworthy attempts at humor, then his surroundings can¡¯t have been too interesting beyond the ubiquitous, cavernous, slime-coated tunnels that made up the vast majority of this space tree. At least I hoped. ¡°Reaching the bend no-¡± I tried to say as we got to the bend in our path that would lead to a straight shot to where our tunnel connected with the rescue group¡¯s, but was interrupted by hissed words coming from my communicator. ¡®Nobody fucking move.¡¯ Were Billy¡¯s words, and a quick glance towards the device attached to my hip showed a blinking light that indicated my outgoing audio had been muted. I hurried around the bend in the tunnel to get a look at what had spooked him like that, but by the time I¡¯d made the turn, I could already hear the gunshots. Rounding a corner, I saw, some fifty meters ahead of me, a trio of people, presumably with three more behind them, having walked out of a connected tunnel to my right and shooting at something further down the tunnel to my left. Not even a second later, a massive ape-like creature with slimy green skin and a pair of tentacles protruding from its back leapt from the tunnel to the left, catching one of the gunmen¡¯s heads in its hand as it fell and instantly crushing it against the floor. Flowing from its landing position, one of its tentacles shot forward and impaled another gunman, lifting them off the ground in time with the creature¡¯s bone-rattling, echoing roar. What? How? When? Why? Unimportant, do something! My brain quickly crashed and rebooted from having had to take in the scene before me. The creature, not content with having instantly killed two people, had already started chasing after the others. If I wanted to do anything, I had to do it before it was too late, so I quickly barked out a set of orders for those behind me and got to it. ¡°Get behind me and stay there!¡± I yelled, hoping they¡¯d hear me as I ran forwards. The creature was no longer visible, having moved further down the other tunnel while chasing down our would-be saviors, but the panicked screams were easy to follow, not to mention the trail of¡­ stuff¡­ that littered the floor of the tunnel in its wake. Hundreds of spent bullet casings strewn about everywhere, along with splashes of dark greenish possibly-blood painted a clear path to follow on the floor of the tunnel that was only a slightly different shade of dark green from the liquid that had been splashed on it, and as we followed the trail further, we started seeing the bodies. Human Bodies. I wanted to throw up, but that would have to wait, for I had shit to do, so instead I called out behind me so the others wouldn¡¯t succumb to that same impulse. ¡°Eyes on me! I need you to watch my back!¡± I ordered, hoping it would be enough. A quick glance behind me showed that Mike and Fae had stuck behind me and were beginning to pale at the sight at their feet, but my cry had apparently brought them back to reality, at least somewhat. I didn¡¯t give them time to refocus on the grizzly sight and ran ahead, turning back for a fraction of a second to ensure they were still on my tail. They were. The first two bodies had been the two that got instantly taken out in the intersection of the two tunnels, and a third could be found not too far ahead. Some distance later, three became four, and when we reached a fifth, I was beginning to lose hope. That was until I noticed a metallic protrusion on the slimy, organic looking walls, its contrast to the surrounding architecture clearly indicating something out of place. It took me a second to note its similarity to the door to our pod and recognize it as the airlock to the shuttle that would get us out of this God forsaken space-tree, with no hulking monstrosity or sixth dead body in sight. My rising hopes were quickly dashed as, slowly emerging from the airlock came a clawed, slimy green hand, followed shortly by its owner that had presumably wiped out our rescuers. It didn¡¯t even take a full step outside before turning to me and charging with another roar. Well, shit. I had once again failed at my job of keeping our expedition safe, costing the lives of yet more people. And here I¡¯d thought I¡¯d get the chance to play the hero by at least saving the captain. I thought ruefully, but caught myself before I could spiral further. Sure, we might be royally fucked, but there¡¯s still two people I can save right now and a monster coming to get them, now is not the time to doubt myself, depression can come later, now¡¯s the time for action! With newfound resolve, I quickly entered a stance. From what little I had seen, that thing¡¯s movements had been pretty much linear, and that made them predictable. With my left foot back and my right foot forward, I crouched slightly and various mechanisms around my body sprang into action, locking my legs and spine in place before coiling tightly, the pressure almost painful as most of my body was compressed as though by ridiculously heavy gravity before executing a predetermined series of motions. I literally couldn¡¯t mess this up even if I tried, the reason why I¡¯d chosen to go with this seemingly barbaric strategy. Twisting as much as I could through my limited range of motion, I looked behind me over my coiled, metallic left arm with a smile that I hoped would be reassuring. ¡°Hey babe?¡± I asked Fae who looked like she¡¯d been paralyzed until I called to her. ¡°Yeah?¡± She asked, dumbfounded. ¡°You¡¯re the best!¡± I said, and all of the force that I¡¯d built up throughout my body released at once, making my left foot push hard off the ground, my right shift to catch my weight and my spine remain ramrod straight while my metallic left fist shot forwards at a speed that would have been impossible for a person lacking any technological augmentations. With a resounding CLANG! the creature¡¯s face was met with an unstoppable rocket moving in its opposite direction and was promptly and comically toppled over, where I held it by placing a foot on what would pass for its chest. While some deep part of me found that whole process entertaining, my eyes immediately went to see the effects of that move, not on its victim, but on those it was meant to help protect. Fae was closest to me, her mouth some strange combination of a smile and a grimace, while her eyes were still terrified but not to the point of zoning out in a panic. She was still with us, even if barely so, and could likely be trusted not to freak out and do something stupid, at least for now Speaking of freaking out, the one most likely to do that, Mike, was simply staring in stunned silence, mouth agape, at everything in front of him. Fuck it, I¡¯ll take it. Satisfied at having prevented a total and irreversible collapse of morale in spite of what we¡¯d just seen, I turned to finish off the monster that had almost taken away our chance at going home in the worst way possible, only to find it attempting to get up and, as soon as it noticed my line of sight, it let out a new roar. This roar, however, was not like the others. The thing certainly had a powerful set of lungs that it had used liberally throughout its chase of the rescue team, but while many of its previous roars could be felt in our bones, this one shook the very walls of the tunnel we were in, bringing up an unpleasant set of memories that I¡¯d hoped I wouldn¡¯t be reminded of. However as the walls continued and even intensified their shaking after the thing was done screaming, I was forced to face reality. That thing just called for help, and we¡¯re about to get swarmed like we were when we got captured. Cursing under my breath, I made a split-second decision to run away back to our pod, leaving the lifesaving shuttle behind. I could see from here the damage done to the airlock that prevented it from closing, meaning the release and take off process would have to take much longer than normal, and that¡¯s time we didn¡¯t have with a horde of monsters inbound. So, after quickly shooting the fucker at my feet in the face, I threw Fae onto my left shoulder and scooped up Mike under my right arm before booking it in the direction we¡¯d come from. It wasn¡¯t long before more of these ¡®Guardians¡¯ started coming out of everywhere. Luckily, the ones that popped up ahead of my path were relatively few and quickly scattered when faced with some machine gun fire from my left arm. It felt like we were making good distance, until I heard Fae call out form my shoulder. ¡°Shit! It¡¯s back! Six o¡¯clock!¡± I heard her say, and spared just a glance to look back. That piece of shit¡¯s still alive?! I thought as I saw the same monster as before, its head battered and bloodied, chasing after me with murder in its eyes. That had almost been shocking enough to make me stumble and fall, but I simply could not afford to do that at that moment. The reason for my shock was that during our time stuck in the pod I had swapped out my space rated ammunition for the kind that was commonly used on Earth. Sure, according to the Feddies, use of higher caliber kinetics while on a vessel outside a breathable atmosphere was, technically, a war crime but honestly, at this point, the risk of a hull breach venting atmosphere was the least of our worries. Case in point, our current situation. That piece of shit took high impact rounds to the face at point blank range and it¡¯s still chasing us?! It¡¯s even gaining on us! Barely able to believe my eyes but recognizing that a straightforward escape would be impossible with that thing still kicking, I skidded to a stop and opened fire on it before it could get close, the deafening scream of the bullets being shot out of my left arm almost being enough to cover up Mike¡¯s undignified yelling and thrashing from my right. I, naturally, had expected the thing to finally accept its fate and become swiss cheese, but, for the second time in this bullshit expedition, I was disappointed, as it covered its head and torso with its arms and tentacles and kept running towards us unimpeded, shrugging off ammunition, which using would likely get me jailed for years and grounded for life like it was nothing. I was about to join Mike in his panicked screaming when Fae called out from my shoulder. ¡°Arm forward, don¡¯t move!¡± She yelled while quickly clambering over my shoulder and coming to land just barely a step ahead of me. She fiddled with my arm for a second and it fell limply on her shoulder, with me having lost all control of it and a fairly large lever now protruding from its side. ¡°Get fisted, idiot!¡± She screamed at the charging abomination. I was halfway through doing a double take at her truly terrible one-liner when feeling returned to my arm, only for it to behave in a way it hadn¡¯t ever before, the sensation almost alien and indescribable, and then something large shot out of where my hand had once been at such speeds that it was made invisible. Its effects, however, were anything but invisible. Within the same second as when the thing was shot off, it had already reached its destination: The big monstrosity that seemed hell-bent on wiping out every last human on this tree, and the following second¡­ There was no such monstrosity charging us, as instead it lay in a smoking heap on the ground, completely dead to the world, and several other Guardians that had apparently been behind it had suffered from the blast as well, outlining a path of destruction that went well past the weapon¡¯s initial target. ¡°The fuck?¡± I eloquently asked. ¡°Happy birthday?¡± Fae squeaked as feeling and control fully returned to my arm. ¡°But that¡¯s a month from now?¡± I said, and she didn¡¯t answer with words, instead holding that same half-terrified-half-proud-all-wide-eyed expression she¡¯d had when she squeaked out her previous words. ¡°Oh my god, I love you!¡± I said, once again throwing her over my shoulder and quickly bolting out of there.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: MICHAEL HAYES SPEC: NAVIGATION
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
Satisfied that we¡¯d gone far enough away, a panting Alex put me and Fae down before collapsing on the spot, the exhaustion of having to run for I don¡¯t even know how long clearly getting to him. I wanted to thank him, for saving our lives yet again, but I was, to put it mildly, having some trouble moving, my entire body utterly paralyzed from shock and exhaustion, both mental, for obvious reasons, and physical, from all that flailing around I¡¯d done while held under his armpit. ¡°Hhhthanbk¡­¡± I rasped out; my voice hoarse from the many unintelligible noises I¡¯d been forced to make in the last two days. ¡°No problem, man, ¡®s what I¡¯m here for.¡± Alex panted, apparently getting my meaning. ¡°So¡­ gonna tell me what that was?¡± He posed the question to Fae in between heavy breaths, while pointing at his metal arm. In response, she just pouted. ¡°It was supposed to be my secret project that I¡¯d get to show you on your birthday when it¡¯s completed next month, but I guess the cat¡¯s out of the bag.¡± She spoke with an exaggerated cutesy pout that was giving me trouble believing my eyes. She had always been one for jokes and whimsy, much like her namesake, but given what had happened not twenty minutes ago, this just felt like a bit much. Apparently, I was wrong, however, as she continued. ¡°So, yeah! It shoots a projectile with a mass of one kilogram in Earth¡¯s gravity that holds two shaped charges, one detonating forward along the path of the projectile and the other radially outwards, so even if you miss, its proximity detonation will ensure you still probably ruin somebody¡¯s day. Now, if you manage to hit something¡­ well, there won¡¯t be much of anything left to ruin¡± She spoke in a jarringly chipper tone. ¡°Shaped charges? Aren¡¯t those supposed to be seriously dangerous armor piercing ammo?¡± Alex asked incredulously, to which Fae just beamed. ¡°Yup! And you can hold two in the chamber plus the three more I have with me in my bag! I call it the Compressed-High-Explosive-Kilogram-Ordinance-Thrower!¡± ¡°That¡¯s a dumb name.¡± I pointed out from where I was still lying face down on the gross, damp tunnel floor. ¡°C-H-¡­ Did you just give me Chekhov¡¯s Rocket Launcher?!¡± Alex asked, excitement in his voice and his exhaustion seemingly forgotten. ¡°It¡¯s not even spelled right.¡± I grumbled, sitting up. ¡°That¡¯s right! So you¡¯d better keep us safe with it!¡± Fae chirped happily once again. ¡°Our entire rescue team is dead! We¡¯re stuck here with nowhere to go!¡± I finally snapped, pointing out what I¡¯d thought would be obvious. ¡°Look, buddy¡­¡± Alex almost wheezed out, his exhaustion apparently coming back to him all at once. ¡°I¡¯m gonna need you to calm the hell down so we can figure out what to do.¡± He finished weakly, but I was having none of it. ¡°CALM DOWN?! HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO CALM DOWN?! DID YOU EVEN SEE WHAT JUST HAPPE-¡± I started my rant, but was interrupted halfway by a tired comment from Alex. ¡°I saw, I was there, what do you want me to do about it?¡± He asked, and my brain practically short-circuited. ¡°Fucking¡­ I don¡¯t know! Shoot them till they die!¡± I yelled, completely freaking out, but I knew as soon as I¡¯d said those words what the answer would be. ¡°Tried it. Twice. Didn¡¯t work.¡± He said, and I could only sit there, defeated. ¡°So, plans?¡± Alex asked the two of us, evidently done with this discussion. I wanted to be angry at him, I really did, but at the same time, I had to recognize he was right, there was only so much any of us could do right now, and asking us to do more would only end up hurting us in the not-so-distant future. ¡°Pod?¡± I begrudgingly offered, and Alex just closed his eyes while Fae considered the option. ¡°It¡¯s probably the safest place to be right now, since the entrance to the shuttle is gonna be crawling with them for a while, at least.¡± She spoke before a frustrated groan emerged from her throat. ¡°Ugh! I wish we hadn¡¯t even left the pod if we¡¯re just gonna have to go back to it!¡± ¡°If we¡¯d done that we¡¯d still be in the same situation, except we wouldn¡¯t know what happened to the rescue party. We wouldn¡¯t be any better off and have less information to work with.¡± Alex commented softly from where he sat with his back up against a tunnel wall and not even opening his tired eyes. ¡°I don¡¯t like it when you make sense¡­ Hurry up and rest faster so you can stop making sense!¡± She grumbled good naturedly, but his comment about having information gave me an idea. ¡°Actually,¡± I started. ¡°Since both the pod and the shuttle are docked to the tree, the pod should have enough fuel to hop from one to the other, so maybe we could sit tight in the pod while they get bored of guarding the shuttle and then get in it from space.¡± ¡°That¡¯s genius!¡± Fae exclaimed, while Alex just gave me a thumbs up and a smile form where he sat. ¡°D¡¯you think it will take longer for them to clear out from that shuttle than it took the pod?¡± She asked. ¡°I mean¡­ I can only assume¡­ but in any case, we need to get back to the pod first!¡± I said, that small glimmer of hope blooming in my soul once more. ¡°Rest now, pod later.¡± Alex muttered sleepily and, with him being the one doing most of the literal heavy lifting, I couldn¡¯t argue with that.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: ALICE LANE SPEC: XENOBIOLOGIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
A warm summer sun shone down through the rustling leaves of the trees that lined the streets of this idyllic little town we¡¯d found. The place was honestly a bit of a dream, with pleasant weather, people and children going about their lives with happy expressions, clean streets decorated with greenery, and an all-around relaxed atmosphere that had led to plenty of friendly interactions with the locals. They had proven themselves to be some truly kind folks, always willing to help each other and myself whenever asked, whether it be with directions or simply a friendly comment. As I was musing on my surroundings, however, I once again noticed the one thing that had been annoying me for a little while when I suddenly felt like my entire focus was yanked in a particular direction back the way I¡¯d come. Okay, that needs to stop. I thought that as I started making my way to wherever that had happened so I could figure out what it was and hopefully put an end to it. It had happened twice before, this being the third time. The first time, it had felt distant enough that it had been easy enough to ignore, the second had been a bit more intense and pulled my attention in a completely different direction, and now this had felt like it¡¯d come from the same spot as the first, but was quite a bit more intense. If this is gonna keep happening constantly, it might just be enough to drive me insane. I thought as I walked. Eventually, I reached the spot where I felt that feeling had originated from. It was the base of an apartment building where I could see Sarah chatting with, of all things, a police officer. ¡°Is¡­ Everything alright?¡± I asked the pair hesitantly once I¡¯d gotten close enough. ¡°Oh, Alice! Hey, I was just waiting for you! We¡¯re all good! My friend here just wanted to see if we needed anything.¡± Sarah said and the police officer glanced at me before turning back to her. ¡°Is she the friend you¡¯d told me about?¡± He asked, and Sarah responded with a cheery ¡°Yup!¡± ¡°Did something happen?¡± I asked and I could swear I almost saw Sarah flinch before answering in the same happy fashion like it was the most normal thing. ¡°No! Why would you think that? We¡¯re all friends here!¡± She said, making me think something had definitely happened. ¡°Right. Well, I¡¯ll leave you two to it. If, for whatever reason, you need anything just give me a call.¡± The police officer said before walking off. ¡°Will do! It was nice meeting you!¡± Sarah called out with a wave and the officer turned back just long enough to respond in kind. ¡°Seriously, is something wrong?¡± I asked her once he was out of earshot and she just deflated with a sigh. ¡°No¡­ Yes. I¡¯m kinda freaking out, honestly. Look, just, come with me, and I¡¯ll explain once we¡¯re inside.¡± With that, we walked into the building. After one quick elevator ride, we entered one of the apartments in this building. It was kinda weird how she would just walk into somebody¡¯s home like she owned the place but I assumed she would explain it soon. ¡°Captain! We¡¯re back!¡± She called into one of the rooms. ¡°Oh, nice. You found- HOLY SHIT!¡± I started, but then stopped as I was greeted by a terrifying sight. ¡°What? What¡¯s wrong?!¡± Sarah asked, completely turning her back to the danger. ¡°Get away!¡± I shouted at the monster that was almost within striking distance. Looming right behind Sarah was one of the Guardians that had captured us just two days prior. Chapter 9: Piecing things together
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
As I sat there, my back up against a wall of the dank pillar-side cave we had climbed into, I took the time to clean out the rough bandages I¡¯d placed over the stab wounds in each of my shoulders the night before while Sarah kept a lookout. By some miracle my arms were back to a mostly functional state, although it would still be some time before I could make some effort with them and not have spikes of pain shooting up and down them. It didn¡¯t really matter, though, I was determined to do what it would take to get everyone back home regardless of how grueling the rehab I would have to do afterwards. ¡°Ooh, Alice¡¯s coming!¡± I heard Sarah call out, and at my nod she disappeared further inside the cave going into who knows where, likely whatever opening she¡¯d used to get inside in the first place. My thoughts on her were conflicted. On one hand, I was deeply relieved that despite everything that had happened and the weird things she apparently saw, she was clearly still in there, apparently of sound mind despite the slugs¡¯ disturbing attempts to turn her to ¡®their side¡¯, whatever that was. On the other, I was worried for her quality of life going forward, as, once we¡¯d gone back home, I could not imagine a way she could go back into society before we could find a way to undo what¡¯s been done to her. At least, not without some serious help. We might need to help her every step of the way while some science crew gets to work on undoing the physical changes. Of course, I was more than willing to be there for her for everything and anything she might need and I did not doubt that everyone else in our little crew would be the same -even if some of them might need a little explaining and convincing- but it being possible to help in some ways didn¡¯t mean it would be easy. Far from it. While I was going through scenarios in my head of the unbelievably awkward conversation that would have to happen when it came time to break the news to her family, I heard the sounds of something walking into the little cave I¡¯d appropriated, the cadence of their footprints easily identifying them as human or Guardian. Not long after first hearing the sounds I saw a Guardian emerging from a too small opening in the wall of the cave and before my mind could run wild with possibilities, I identified it to be Sarah. She wore what looked like a resigned smile on her face and was silent, and once she was done popping out of the hole in the wall that had stretched to accommodate her size, she was followed by Alice. I was about to greet them when the latter of the two suddenly fell flat on her ass with a wild, fang baring hiss from her mouth and she then scrambled backwards. Sarah had a confused expression on her face but was still quiet, and I had a terrible feeling. Oh, shit¡­ I thought with a concerned inner voice. ¡°Alice, Sarah, what¡¯s going on?¡± I asked, already fearing the answer. ¡°She says there¡¯s one of them!¡± said Sarah, the worry in her face matching her tone. I turned around, wishing for there to be a monster staring at me behind my back, but there was nothing, only the somewhat distant opening to the cave I¡¯d set up in. I turned my head back to the pair that had just entered and knelt down, doing my best to appear unthreatening. ¡°Alice, look at me, focus on my words-¡° I started, but quickly stopped myself when I caught a telltale twitch from her that I¡¯d grown tired of seeing the last two days. ¡°Get AWAY!¡± She yelled, for the first time making a sound other than a hiss since arriving and shooting a spike tipped tentacle from her back that would have speared through my head had I not noticed the tell and moved out of the way. I took the opening to back off out of reach, both unsure of what to do and worried about what would happen if this situation was allowed to escalate further. ¡°Sarah, little help?¡± I asked her and with a nod towards me, she went to kneel down beside Alice -who by this point had transitioned into a predatory crouch ready to pounce at me at a moment¡¯s notice- placing herself between the two of us. ¡°Hey. Hey!¡± She called, louder the second time as the first had failed to grab the other woman¡¯s attention. ¡°We¡¯re not in danger, this is what I was talking about before, things are¡­ weird¡± After taking a second to process her words, Alice sat back with an expression that practically radiated bafflement, her body language not as tense as it had been but still ready to jump at the first sign of movement. Taking that for the unspoken question that it was, Sarah continued. ¡°So, yeah. First of all, don¡¯t freak out but¡­ That¡¯s,¡± She said, pointing at me. ¡°The captain.¡± She finished and I could see Alice look confused before some twisted form of worried comprehension wrote itself on her face. ¡°That¡¯s her?! Oh, god, what did they do to you?! When did they get you?! Are you okay?¡± She asked, standing up from her crouch and making to dart for where I stood, her movements no longer as aggressive but still plenty fear inducing. ¡°Woah! Woah!¡± I said, stopping her before she could get to close. ¡°There¡¯s still more you need to know.¡± I stopped her, motioning for Sarah, who had a hand on her shoulder that would have stopped her if she had not reacted to my call, to continue. ¡°Right¡­¡± She started reluctantly, and I felt a stab to my heart at making her do this but it would be better for this to come out of her mouth than it would be mine. ¡°Remember when we woke up this morning and all of a sudden, we were all back to normal?¡± Alice nodded. ¡°Well¡­¡±
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
My gut twisted at the sight of my friend being put through what I¡¯d gone through after a dry smack to the back of the head. Once I¡¯d finished my explanation, the captain ordered my emotionally tired self and a stunned Alice to quickly deal with the thing at the nape of her neck, which she would do by smacking it with a stick like she¡¯d done for me earlier, a painful experience that had driven me to my knees and caused me to barf my guts out, and through which Alice had fared only slightly better. She was currently cleaning out the last of the vomit that had almost erupted from her mouth, much like it had mine earlier in the day, when whatever the thing was that was messing with her head got damaged, and I crouched beside her, making sure her hair didn¡¯t get covered in nasty and generally just offering her what support I could. If there had been anything else that could have been done instead of whatever this messed up ritual was, I would have suggested it, but with seeming confirmation that whatever that thing did was still progressing, putting off dealing with it wasn¡¯t an option. Moreover, as if to confirm my fears, her pile of vomit was noticeably smaller and¡­ I guess clumpier than mine, which was a weird thing to try to correlate with being driven crazy but I was far past caring. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. ¡°Hey Sarah?¡± Chloe asked from where she stood three steps away. ¡°What do I look like to you?¡± She asked when I looked up at her. ¡°Like yourself?¡± I answered, and this time Alice was the one to look up, confused. ¡°No, she doesn¡¯t. She looks like a Guardian.¡± She said with certainty despite being wrong, which I could understand from having been in the same position, betrayed by my own eyes. Chloe, meanwhile, for the first time since our morning misunderstanding, wore a smile with not a hint of sadness, not one that hid worry about her previous actions or a fake one aimed to make us feel better, just a normal, if anything relieved, smile. ¡°See, what did I tell you? I have a knack for this¡± She said, twirling her stick like she was answering some big unspoken question. At my confused look, she continued. ¡°What, did you already forget what I said about my biggest talent? This just confirms that what happened to you can be stopped, and if it can be stopped then I see no reason why it couldn¡¯t be reversed. Like I said, I¡¯m getting you home safe and sound.¡± I had to stifle a gasp as hope started building up in my chest. Deep down I hadn¡¯t believed Chloe when she¡¯d said she would undo this whole mess we¡¯d found ourselves in. I had a hard time believing it would even be possible, but after this, I began to realize she might have a point. In the span of only a few hours she had, by herself, figured out a key aspect of how our forced transformation worked and even found a way to stop it from progressing. And she did it by smacking the problem with a stick! I joked inwardly to myself, but I also thought that if she could do something like that with a method this crude, there was no way that the people back home wouldn¡¯t be able to take care of the problem entirely. It was a comforting thought. Alice, on the other hand, didn¡¯t seem to share my enthusiasm, staring dejectedly at the small pile of nasty stuff that had come out of her. ¡°Hey¡­¡± I asked her softly, not able to think of a way to ask her what was wrong without souring her mood further. ¡°Huh?¡± She muttered when she noticed my questioning gaze. ¡°Oh, right¡­ Yeah, that¡¯s¡­ That¡¯s good.¡± She said, and I prompted her to elaborate with a soft squeeze of her shoulder. ¡°It¡¯s just¡­ I guess I was still holding on to hope¡­ That it was all real, and we¡¯d just found a town filled with nice people¡± ¡°And that they¡¯d got to me?¡± The captain asked with a smirk. ¡°NO!¡± Alice yelled, outraged, a second before we both realized that in her version of reality, the town being real would mean that Chloe getting turned would also be real. When the thought struck her, she shrunk back with a faint flush at her own reaction. ¡°Hey, relax. I could never be offended by you showing you care about me.¡± Chloe said, kneeling down to be at eye level with Alice and hesitantly grabbing one of her hands. ¡°And besides, I think you already know, there is nothing that could be done to either of us that could keep me away from you, and I know for a fact that everyone who¡¯s not here will agree with me. Mike especially.¡± She finished, really laying it on thick. It seemed to work, though, as Alice appeared to be eating it up. She no longer looked to be as terrified of what was to come and, if she had been slightly flushed before, her entire face was now a deeply embarrassed shade of red, as clear an indication as one could get that her thoughts had been steered well away from the dark path they¡¯d been in before. ¡°Sarah, think you can take watch a little longer?¡± Chloe asked, helping Sarah to her feet. ¡°Sure thing.¡± I answered, because what the hell else was I going to say at that point? As I was walking to the balcony to keep a look-out, I glanced back to spot the pair sitting next to each other on a couch giving each other a side hug. Alice leaned onto Chloe, nestling her head between the other¡¯s head and shoulder. The captain at first turned her head away with a grimace, a grim reminder that what I was seeing was not the same as what they were experiencing, but quickly seemed to force herself to overcome her discomfort and lean her head against the person next to her. All things considered I guess this went about as well as it could¡¯ve. I can only imagine what would have happened if it had been someone like Mike instead of Alice. He¡¯d probably still be freaking out! I thought with a tiny giggle that turned into a sigh before turning my attention to scanning the crowd that went about their day-to-day lives in this fake town I couldn¡¯t name.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: MICHAEL HAYES SPEC: NAVIGATION
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°Look, I¡¯m not gonna sugarcoat it,¡± Said Alex, staring at the grim sight ahead of us. ¡°We might be screwed.¡± On the plus side, after backtracking all the way back to our pod and finding a safe vantage point to observe its surroundings and plan an approach, we¡¯d found that most of the Guardians that liked to loiter around it looking for someone to maul had cleared out, leaving only a few to spot us on our approach. On the other hand, the pod that we had planned to use to do a space hop over to the shuttle that could finally get us out of here, was nowhere to be found. In its place was a gaping hole venting atmosphere into the uncaring void, our pod and like a half dozen Guardians floating away from us, never to be seen again. All the while, whatever Guardians were left behind worked tirelessly to plug up the hole in spite of the force of the atmosphere rushing past them, and the hole was already noticeably smaller than the one our pod would have made. ¡°Ah, shit.¡± Said Fae, clearly agreeing with the larger man¡¯s outlook on the situation. ¡°Guess we¡¯re back to square one then. So, we go to the shuttle and fight everything on the way?¡± ¡°That¡¯s a quick and easy way to get killed or worse.¡± Said Alex, stating the obvious. Fae looked angry for a second and then pushed back with some energy. ¡°Well what the hell else can we even do at this poi-?¡± ¡°No.¡± I interrupted whatever was happening before it could devolve any further. ¡°No?¡± Asked Fae incredulously. ¡°No.¡± I answered again, deep in thought. ¡°Elaborate?¡± She asked, more confused than she¡¯d been angry. ¡°I¡¯ve been thinking about it on the way over, these things got an entire giant tree into orbit, so they have to have some way of moving up and down from the surface. Maybe we can use that to get a lift to the mothership? We already know our shuttle will be crawling with creatures and now it looks like they¡¯ll dump it into space before letting us get close¡­¡± ¡°You want to bet our survival on some alien technology that may or may not actually be there and that, as far as our intel is concerned, shouldn¡¯t even exist?¡± She questioned. ¡°Yes.¡± ¡°Wait, really?¡± She questioned. Whether she was surprised at my words or that I was even the one saying them, I could not know. Regardless, I continued. ¡°We¡¯ve been running around like headless chickens, going to the pod, then to the shuttle, back to the pod and now to the shuttle again. Hell, we¡¯re lucky to even be alive after what happened to the rescue crew¡­ If we keep doing the same thing over and over¡­ Our luck is gonna run out eventually.¡± ¡°Huh. And how do you expect us to even fly this supposed Alien ship that most definitely exists and won¡¯t lead to a dead end that will leave us cornered?¡± Fae questioned sarcastically, but I was prepared for this, that being the exact question I had already asked myself as I thought of this hare-brained scheme. ¡°Well, I don¡¯t know, exactly, but we¡¯ve got a dedicated pilot, a crazy engineer that knows how to work with pretty much anything, and a walking toolbox. If it can be done, then¡­ We can do it.¡± I finished resolutely. ¡°And if it can¡¯t be done?¡± She asked pointedly. ¡°Then we¡¯re dead already.¡± I finished grimly. ¡°¡­¡± ¡°¡­¡± ¡°What?¡± I asked the silent duo. ¡°Who are you? What have you done with Mike Shits-his-pants?¡± Asked Fae, to which I just glared at her. ¡°Well, I don¡¯t have any better ideas, so if the big guy¡¯s okay with it¡­¡± Fae started, and upon receiving a stupefied nod from Alex, she continued. ¡°I guess we¡¯re going with that.¡± When she finished, we all turned back, heading deeper into the tree and going into parts unknown, which we would attempt to explore with a crew less than half its original size. ¡°You¡¯re a tool¡­¡± I caught Alex shyly grumbling, earning himself a giggle from Fae. I am so done with this space tree. Chapter 10: You did WHAT?!
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
I awoke gently from where I¡¯d sat with Alice on a particularly soft but visually indistinct spot in the cave we¡¯d taken over. At first I¡¯d felt relaxed, the pain from the stab wounds on my shoulders mostly gone. Then I started remembering the source of those stab wounds and my mood came crashing down. I took some solace in reminding myself that I¡¯d reunited with two of the three people I¡¯d been forced to run away with after I¡¯d foolishly made them split up, which led to me noticing that one of them had fallen asleep right beside me and in her sleep, had grabbed me in a tight hug. I guess that goes some way towards explaining why I woke up so relaxed. Alice¡¯s unconscious form lying next to and leaning on me looked so serene it was almost as though she had a calming aura about her. Of course, that was only until I woke up enough to acknowledge the dark mottled green skin, the thick coat of goop of unknown origin, and the additional limbs that made the hug that she was giving me simply way more hug than any single person should be able to give at a time. I lay there, for a second, thinking about my actions before passing out. Making yet more promises I didn¡¯t know if I could keep. Telling them exactly what they¡¯d want to hear. I felt like utter shit for treating people I cared about like that. Some Captain I am¡­ Fuck it, what¡¯s done is done, I can apologise once we¡¯re out of here. Besides, they need this¡­ or something like this anyway. I reassured myself, thinking about how our interactions could have gone as I started the process of carefully extricating myself from the tangle of limbs featuring an uncomfortable number of sharp points I¡¯d found myself in. Thinking about it, it might have been borderline miraculous I¡¯d got them to listen to me in the face of what might very well be mind control. After more time than I¡¯d care to admit, I finally managed to remove myself from my spot without waking Alice ¨Cwhich was the real miracle here¨C and turned to the mouth of the cave, where Sarah had been watching me since about halfway through my struggles. ¡°How long was I out for?¡± I asked her as I reached the opening and sat beside her. ¡°Like two hours, give or take.¡± She answered, having turned her eyes to the view of the expansive cavern dotted with columns and creatures moving up, down and between them, and not meeting my eyes. ¡°Ah. Sorry.¡± I apologised for having her take a much longer watch than she was supposed to. Se didn¡¯t answer, continuing to look outwards with an unfocused gaze. After a few seconds, I asked what I would imagine would be on her mind. ¡°Still no sign of Curt?¡± ¡°Nope.¡± She answered sullenly, popping the ¡®p¡¯ for added effect. It was well past the time we all should have reconvened, and if he had showed up at the spot where we¡¯d split up, he would have been visible from where we now sat. This led to the conclusion that something had happened to hold him up or worse. I felt I should do something, and I didn¡¯t doubt for a second that Sarah felt the same, the question was what. We couldn¡¯t just go look for him since then he might show up at the meeting spot and find no one, and we couldn¡¯t split up agai- ¡°I¡¯m going out to find him.¡± Said Sarah, standing up and interrupting my thoughts. ¡°No you¡¯re not.¡± I told her. ¡°Yes I am.¡± She said, and this conversation was going nowhere. ¡°And split us up again? That¡¯s the whole reason we¡¯re in this situation.¡± I told her, trying to get her to see reason, but she just wasn¡¯t having it. ¡°Look, I¡¯ll be fine, I¡¯m one of them, remember?¡± She pointed down at herself, and her words worried me. ¡°You¡¯re one of us, Sarah.¡± I affirmed, making sure to emphasize the last two words as I hopped back into the excessively reassuring, borderline manipulative mindset I¡¯d used to defuse two separate panic attacks within the span of thirty minutes. ¡°Yeah, yeah, I know.¡± She deflected me immediately. ¡°Point is, they think I¡¯m one of them. I can move around among them and they won¡¯t bat an eye. I can promise I¡¯ll be right back, and I¡¯ll stay within sight of this balcony, but right now, I¡¯m going.¡± She finished resolutely while I was still processing that the mouth of this cave was apparently a balcony in her eyes. Eventually I just nodded. It was clear her mind was made up and if she could move around unimpeded then her plan might have merit. ¡°Great! Keep an eye on Alice, please! Maybe don¡¯t let her see those¡­¡± She said, pointing to the two dead pillslugs that I still couldn¡¯t decide what to do with. How the hell they hadn¡¯t started to smell, I had no idea. ¡°See you soon!¡± Sarah said before disappearing deeper into the cave to presumably use whatever means the pillslugs had to move up and down the columns from within. Sure enough, I soon saw her emerge from the base of our column and move out among the sea of pillslugs to find our scout and her partner. She moved completely unimpeded, the locals paying her no mind and even moving out of her way, slowly as they were. I settled down to track her with one eye while keeping a lookout for Curt with the other, all while trying to keep an eye out for when Alice woke up or if anything snuck up on us through the mysterious entrance at the back of the cave. I¡¯m gonna need more eyes¡­
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
I walked nearly aimlessly through the packed streets of the unnamed town, trying to look through a sea of people to find the shortest guy I knew, all while staying within sight of the apartment the captain had taken over. The thought of that apartment and its former inhabitants was still a source of concern, even if I knew that they weren¡¯t what I saw them as. The information we¡¯d been provided after our first briefing on our mission here had been clear, the pillslugs did not have the brain or analogue structures that, as far as humanity and every member species of the Galactic Federation had been able to tell, were hard requirements for any biological creature to achieve sentience. And yet, here I was, strolling among a sea of people, asking for directions, and thinking about those lifeless eyes¡­ I shook those thoughts off, reminding myself that things weren¡¯t what they appeared to be and I still wasn¡¯t a hundred percent sure how much my mind was being messed with, all while making a conscious effort to focus my mind on the task at hand. After a few more minutes, I was rewarded for my efforts by the sound of a voice that could barely be heard above the din of hundreds of conversations taking place in this packed street. ¡°Look sir, I¡¯m sorry about what happened to you, but there really isn¡¯t much else I can do in this situation.¡± Said a voice I recognized instantly and quickly followed to find Curt trying to appease an irate man with a grey goatee while simultaneously fixing up a veggie stand? ¡°But my cabbages! Those ruffians must pay for ruining them! You must find them!¡± The man screamed his lungs out while hope gradually but steadily drained from Curt¡¯s face. I almost didn¡¯t feel like going in to save him, and if I¡¯d had popcorn on hand I definitely wouldn¡¯t have. Sadly, we had important things to do and people waiting for us, so I had to intervene. ¡°He¡¯s got a point, you know? This wanton destruction of cabbage cannot stand.¡± I said with a smile, stepping to where he could see. Curt, for his part, immediately dropped the wheel he had been about to affix to the merchant¡¯s wreck of a cart, causing the whole thing to come crashing down with a wave of spilled greenery, while he just gave me his best ¡®starved man in a desert¡¯ expression. ¡°I don¡¯t think I¡¯ve ever been more glad to see you.¡± He said with reverence, which made me chuckle. ¡°Right, well, why don¡¯t we go find those ruffians who would destroy this poor man¡¯s livelihood?¡± I asked, looking for a quick and easy way to get us away from the angry old man Curt had been forced to deal with. We were worrying and this is what he¡¯s been up to for three hours? The thought was so ridiculous I didn¡¯t know whether to laugh or groan in annoyance. ¡°Hmph! See that you do!¡± The old tradesman harrumphed and then went to tend to his broken cart by his lonesome. I offered Curt a hand, which he took to get up and then we got out of there as fast as we possibly could without making it seem like we were completely ditching the old man, which, to be fair, we were. ¡°So¡­¡± I started, holding back a laugh. ¡°Is this what you¡¯ve been doing for the last three hours?¡± I asked him, unable to resist after having run away from that surreal situation. ¡°Ugh, no!¡± He groaned. ¡°I ran into these weird creatures that were running around making a mess of things so I chased them away into this weird, goop filled tunnel. I got most of them but some got away and I couldn¡¯t find them after the fact, so I went around trying to clean up the mess until it was time to regroup. Speaking of, how long do we have until¡­ Why are you making that face?¡± I was beyond stunned. ¡°Say that again.¡± I told him. ¡°Ugh, no?¡± He questioned with the beginnings of a cheeky grin. ¡°What do you mean no?!¡± I demanded. ¡°It was the first thing I said!¡± He defended himself, his nascent grin abandoned. ¡°Then after that?¡± I egged him on. ¡°I saw some weird creatures?¡± He continued. ¡°Uh-huh.¡± ¡°Making a mess?¡± ¡°Uh-huh¡± ¡°I chased them down and got most of them.¡± I didn¡¯t answer that one. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. ¡°And then I went about helping the people that¡¯d been affected.¡± He finished like that last point even mattered to me. ¡°Look, if this is about me losing track of time, I¡¯m-¡± He started defending himself, but I interrupted him since he clearly was missing the point, and I didn¡¯t know if I could even blame him. ¡°And what did you do with the¡­ tunnel?¡± I asked him, picking my words carefully, making sure to refer to it the same way he had. ¡°Huh?¡± He asked, looking extremely confused. ¡°You said you chased them to a goop filled tunnel. What happened to it?¡± I clarified, hoping for one answer, but was left disappointed. ¡°I torched it, obviously. Can¡¯t have vermin running around making nests around the city!¡± He said it like everything was right with the world. ¡°Oh, shit.¡± Were the only words that could come out of my mouth. There¡¯s a lot to unpack here. ¡°Now that you mentioned the city,¡± I started after a while, hoping to begin the process of letting him see what was truly going on and how it was different from what our eyes were telling us. ¡°Do you happen to know its name?¡± ¡°Yeah, Skyhaven V.¡± He answered as though stating the obvious, dashing my hopes yet again. ¡°What?¡± ¡°Skyhaven V. The fifth of seven cities in this Skyshelter we managed to launch into the heavens. Hence, Skyhaven.¡± He explained. ¡°Again, what?¡± ¡°Well, it¡¯s a bit of a clever play on words on-¡± He started going on a tangent that I quickly cut off. ¡°No, I mean¡­ How do you know this, exactly?¡± I asked him, holding back a groan. ¡°Doesn¡¯t everybody?¡± He answered my question with another question, and it became clear to me that I would need some help with him.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CURT WOODSWARD SPEC: SCOUT/SUB-CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
Sarah had been acting weird, which left me feeling conflicted. I was still glad to both have her with me and to have something harmless to talk about after that debacle with the Guardians but it had started to get worrying. Right when I resolved to ask her about it the next time she asked about something along the lines of the color of the sky, she dropped the subject and bid me follow her to an apartment she¡¯d found. I didn¡¯t know she¡¯d wanted to move here, or even if this was the right time, we still had a job to do and friends to find, after all, but went with her all the same. It was clear that there was something on her mind that she didn¡¯t want to talk about right then and there, so I resolved to just offer her my silent support until she was ready to talk. We walked along the streets of Skyhaven V ¨Cor just Five, for short, given that all the towns up here had almost the same name¨C in somewhat awkward silence. I held her hand in mine and she gave me a smile but still refused to tell me what was bothering her. The people around us, meanwhile, were as friendly as ever, many greeting us as we walked and street sellers peddling their wares often tried to give us free samples, which we politely declined every time since we apparently had somewhere to be. Only when we had reached the building that had caught her eye and were in the middle of an elevator ride, did she finally open up. ¡°So, this is gonna sound weird, but please bear with me, okay?¡± She started hesitantly. ¡°Okay?¡± ¡°So, don¡¯t you think it¡¯s weird that there¡¯s suddenly a town full of people even though we were sent to explore an alien planet?¡± She asked me, for some reason. ¡°Not really, this is just the most recent megastructure we¡¯ve launched into space and we¡¯re cleaning out the aliens from it. There being both people and aliens here is the whole reason we have a job.¡± I explained, somewhat incredulously. ¡°Right¡­ Well, when was the last time you remember seeing our friends?¡± She asked, a worried expression on her face that I couldn¡¯t understand the cause for. ¡°Well, for Alex, Fae and Mike, it was after we got captured by some aliens and then they split us up. For Chloe and Alice, we escaped the aliens together so I guess it¡¯d be after the captain had her little freakout and sent us each on our way.¡± I answered her question, still humoring her but with a growing concern. There was clearly something she wasn¡¯t telling me but I wasn¡¯t sure if it was worth pushing her on it. While this was all happening the elevator had reached its destination and we walked out into a plain white painted corridor with a tiled floor of a matching color, the walls interspersed with closed wooden doors leading to various apartments. She walked past all the closed doors and stopped in front of one that was slightly ajar. Weird. Weirder still was that the furniture inside this apartment that she guided me into featured pictures of an old couple and a family I¡¯d never seen before. ¡°And don¡¯t you remember anything weird that happened between Chloe¡¯s freakout and our escape from the aliens?¡± Sarah continued her line of questioning, though her eyes held an apprehension that the rest of her had tried and was starting to fail to hide. ¡°No, why?¡± I asked her slowly. ¡°Ugh, screw this.¡± She started furiously with a groan, apparently having run out of patience to get to the point she¡¯d been building towards. ¡°Look, this all-???¡± She started but cut herself off strangely. ¡°What was that?¡± I asked her. Her face looked dismayed at my question but she quickly rallied. ¡°I said-¡± This time, it was I who cut her off, as I heard some concerning sounds coming from deeper in the apartment. It sounded vaguely like words mixed with the same chewing and sloughing that I¡¯d come to dread since getting on this space tree. I turned a corner to find my dreams realized in the worst way possible, as I saw a Guardian that had Alice pinned to the ground, its claws, fangs and tentacle spikes all poised to finish off her prone form. There were no thoughts in my head as I lunged to try to get the thing off my friend as fast as humanly possible before the unthinkable could happen. In the back of my mind, I barely registered Sarah try to hold me back but I wasn¡¯t about to stop right then. Darting at a speed I had impressed myself with hours before, I threw myself at the creature with the hopes that it would be of the kind I could handle, as opposed to the ones that had taken us prisoner just yesterday and started this whole mess. It was all I could do in this situation since I had not even a second to spare. My hopes were dashed, however, as just as I was about to reach it, the thing hit me in the jaw with a frankly beautifully executed backhand that knocked me just enough off course that I sailed past it rather than into it. Intellectually, I could tell that this thing was not as much of a monster as the one that had thrown me around a while ago, but I found myself not caring since I hadn¡¯t been able to track that hit at all, and they both hurt just as badly. I gathered my senses and stood back up to find Alice held hostage by that abominable creature by the back of her neck, its fangs poised to dig into the flesh of her shoulder. ¡°Wait! Stooo-!¡± She yelled, but was interrupted by the monster tossing her bodily in my direction. I caught her as best I could, and started harrying the thing with blows and feints that it blocked or avoided. During that, I¡¯d focused on avoiding any of its hits since its various stabbing appendages would naturally be more dangerous than my bare fists, but that also meant I couldn¡¯t commit to putting the bastard down and the slippery shit avoided me at every turn. Soon, I came to understand why. In my rush to save Alice and subsequent hit to the face, I had flown past the thing from my starting spot near the entrance to the apartment. It had then thrown Alice at me, whom I¡¯d caught and placed behind me so I could push the monster back. Towards the doors of the apartment. Where Sarah hadn¡¯t moved from. With a wicked glint in its pitch black eyes, the creature turned its back on me and moved to where Sarah stood stunned still with a speed it had only shown when it reacted to my first lunge. Before I could even do anything about it, the thing was behind her and baring its fangs to her exposed neck. ¡°Stop!¡± She cried, but it was pointless, the thing wouldn¡¯t listen and now that it was aware of me, I would never make it in time. I closed my eyes just before the countless needle-like teeth broke her skin. ¡°Curt! Stop it!¡± I heard Sarah¡¯s voice again, urging me to help her. Confused, I opened my eyes only to be greeted with the same scene once again. That monster holding Sarah from behind as it prepared to dig its fangs into her. I averted my eyes. ¡°What¡¯s wrong with you, Curt?¡± I heard Alice say before seeing her shuffling past me and towards the Guardian that still held Sarah hostage. The second she was in range, the monster proceeded to claw her face- Opening my eyes again, the bastard now had two hostages and was making a show of preparing to- Okay, what the fuck is going on?!
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
I watched from my vantage spot as Sarah combed the valleys between columns in search of our missing team member. She moved this way and that, navigating the mess of small moving bodies with almost unsettling ease and an uncanny grace, before making a turn to the left and dipping behind a column, out of sight. I heard movement behind me. Quickly whipping my head around to meet the possible danger, I saw Alice stir from where she lay and groggily open her almost fully dark eyes. Her pupils were still her normal brown, but they were almost lost in the sea that had become her pitch black sclera that made it hard to track what she was looking at. She got up, stretched and flinched when she saw me, then nearly jumped when she noticed the two dead pillslugs laying some distance away. ¡°Wow, that¡­ Really happened, huh?¡± She asked me, and I was equal parts glad that she wasn¡¯t reacting more violently to what she was seeing, and sad at what she must be going through. ¡°Yeah.¡± I answered, unable to find any better words to say at that moment. I quickly recentered myself, and set about making sure everyone was as comfortable as I could make them given the situation so we could get out of here as soon as possible. ¡°But we¡¯ll get through this, don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll make sure-¡± ¡°You don¡¯t have to do that.¡± She interrupted me, and if I thought I¡¯d centered myself before I was now completely off-balance. ¡°Do what?¡± I asked her. ¡°That thing you do where you go all reassuring on us. You don¡¯t have to do it anymore.¡± She explained, sitting back down while I stayed in my spot in stunned and confused silence at being called out like that. At my baffled expression, she continued: ¡°Don¡¯t get me wrong, it helped. More than you can know, even. But I¡¯m good now, I think.¡± ¡°Right.¡± I said, short for words again. Alice, meanwhile, came to sit by my side looking out the opening of our cave. A questing tentacle came to crawl over my hand, making me quickly pull it back. This made Alice look hurt, first, and then turn sheepish. ¡°Sarah?¡± She asked after a while. ¡°Went out to look for Curt.¡± ¡°And you¡¯re not worried about having us split up agai-?¡± ¡°Yes.¡± I answered her question before she could even finish it, and we stayed in silence for a while longer. This was eventually interrupted by some sounds coming from the back of the cave. ¡°Someone¡¯s coming, you think that¡¯s them?¡± Alice asked me while I was getting up and it took me a second to realise what she was talking about. Oh, right, they come and go from somewhere towards the back of the cave and the center of the column. I should ask about that. Before I could voice my doubts, however, I saw a gigantic missile of flesh flying at me and it was all I could do to draw a spike from my back and use it to slap away the incoming living projectile before it could barrel into me, using the hit to redirect it just enough that it sailed past me and out the mouth of the cave. I¡¯d thought that was that, but I noticed a clawed hand gripping the edge of the cave, and watched as a giant Guardian, one that would make Alex look like a twig, pulled itself up over the edge with a crazed expression on its face before throwing itself at me once again. This thing was ape-like, reminiscent of a gorilla if they were twice as fast, with wicked claws, fangs and a pair of spike-tipped tentacles, topped off with a gaze that radiated malice. While it shared the same mottled green coloration of everything we¡¯d seen in this tree, it was also covered in spots of discoloured red-turned-brown, especially around the tips of its fingers and tentacles, and around its face. While I was readying myself to meet its charge, making a plan in my head to jump to the side or do something, anything, to avoid colliding with it head-on, Alice, who hadn¡¯t moved from where she¡¯d sat beside me, suddenly appeared blocking the thing''s path, completely catching me off-guard because of how quiet she¡¯d been. Apparently, this also surprised the monster, as it carefully caught her and moved her aside before focusing its attention back on me. Having slowed down practically to a stop, the creature no longer had enough distance between us to try another charge, so it started taking swipes at me with its multitude of sharp points that it was all I could do to parry and bat away before they could reach me. I noticed, however, that the thing was cautious. Normally, when the opponent had the size and weight advantage, they would tend to try and use it to bring an end to a fight by using grapples and tackles to immobilise, something I¡¯d done my best to teach Alex to stop doing as it made him predictable. This thing, on the other hand, made no further moves to jump on me after its first two charges failed, instead being content with using its reach advantage to try and corner me. This meant I had more time to react, as its blows had to cover a greater distance to reach me, but it also meant that I didn¡¯t have the range to strike back without doing something stupid like throwing a spike at it and hoping I¡¯d hit some important part of its alien anatomy, which could backfire spectacularly if I missed and then found myself without a weapon. I was also keenly aware that as I continued to backpedal away from the incoming assault, I was slowly being cornered against the back of the cave, so I¡¯d have to try something sooner rather than later. Off the corner of my eye I saw Sarah standing behind me with what I thought was a confused expression. When I had an opening, I disengaged from the mad monster trying to tear into me and moved in her direction. ¡°Little help?¡± I asked her. This seemed to shake her out of her stupor, as she moved to place herself between me and my attacker, still not saying a word in the process. I was dumbfounded, for a moment, as I¡¯d meant for her to help me deal with the thing, not to throw herself headfirst into danger, but to my surprise, the monster stopped in its tracks. Sarah was then joined by Alice, who walked past the monster with an annoyed body language and settled by her side, confusing me even more in the process. Right, ''one of them'', she''d said that earlier. ¡°Okay, what the fuck is going on?¡± I asked everyone present. ¡°I could ask you the same.¡± It was Sarah who answered, like this all was my fault, but this wasn¡¯t a situation I could allow to devolve into childish squabbles. ¡°Explain.¡± I ordered. ¡°That¡¯s Curt.¡± She nearly spat, but that didn¡¯t at all explain anything to me. ¡°No, it¡¯s not.¡± ¡°Yes it is.¡± ¡°That¡¯s the pipsqueak?¡± I asked, pointing at the massive mountain of hatred that had attacked me less than a minute before. ¡°Yes!¡± Sarah answered emphatically. ¡°Oooh¡­¡± I trailed off, it dawning on me that he¡¯d been away from us for far longer than he should have, and who knew what had even happened to him in that time. It was still jarring, the image of our short and reliable scout in my head clashing with the wild behemoth standing before me. ¡°That¡¯s the captain.¡± Sarah said unprompted. ¡°What about me?¡± I asked her. ¡°Yes it is.¡± She continued, ignoring my question, and was followed by Alice muttering ¡°Here we go again¡­¡± It was then that I realized they weren¡¯t talking to me, and all those times I¡¯d felt like I caught them mid-conversation suddenly made more sense. He thinks I¡¯m one of them. Also, if I wasn¡¯t sure they had some way of talking to each other besides speaking out loud, I am now. My mind went back to the last two times I¡¯d had to convince someone that I wasn¡¯t some bloodthirsty monster and the thought immediately made me exhausted. Luckily, this time I had help, and Sarah seemed to be handling most of it if her intense expression and the monster backing away were any indication. No one in this cave made a sound, but it was clear that an intense conversation was still going on. ¡°Are we going to have a problem?¡± I eventually asked, my curiosity at this silent dialogue getting the better of me while also trying to rebuild some semblance of my authority as the leader of this little group. My words made Sarah flinch. Unexpected. Also, probably not a good sign. ¡°Well, no¡­¡± She said, her gaze turning to me and losing its intensity in the process. ¡°I sense a ¡®but?¡± I asked, hoping to be wrong. ¡°...But I think he found the rescue party before us¡­ And killed them.¡± She said, the words coming reluctantly out of her mouth, yet still shocking me and Alice into complete silence. I didn¡¯t have long to process the implications of what was just said, because while Alice and I were frozen, the thing¨C ¡®Curt¡¯¨C was not, instead letting out a mighty roar that shook the walls of the cavern, and proceeding to claw wildly at the walls around him and even at his own face, his jaws snapping blindly at the air. ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± I asked anyone who could answer. ¡°He¡¯s freaking out!¡± Said Alice. I could see that. ¡°Hey. HEY! It¡¯s alright! It wasn¡¯t your fault!¡± Sarah tried to get his attention to no effect, being met with another ear-splitting roar for her troubles. ¡°I¡¯m not lying to you!¡± She continued, starting to inch closer to the man turned beast. ¡°I would never lie to you. You¡¯ll be fine once the cap-¡± I had to hold her back before she could get hurt. It didn¡¯t take a genius to figure out that Curt wasn¡¯t thinking clearly, and him accidentally hurting the woman who was best suited to anchoring him in reality might just push him over the edge. Unsure of how to handle this strange situation, my eyes turned to examine him one more time. His oversized body was unrecognizable from what it had been. His hands tipped with claws covered in splotches of reddish-brown hinting at being used for a purpose they never should have. Those tentacles emerging from his back, covered in the same vile reddish-brown, flailing and twisting in a visceral representation of his fraying mental state. His mouth, also covered in the same flaking reddish-brown and not having produced a single intelligible word since our reunion. His eyes, with their alien black sclera, yet there was also something more. A light deep inside that refused to be snuffed out. The man he had been, desperately attempting to reach past the alien bits that had been plastered on him to ask for help in a way he no longer could. Well, time to do what I do best. ¡°Sarah, Alice, stand aside.¡± I ordered them. ¡°If he won¡¯t believe you, I¡¯ll show him exactly who I am.¡± Chapter 11: Did an Oopsie
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CURT WOODSWARD SPEC: SCOUT/SUB-CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
THE FOLLOWING TOOK PLACE AND WAS RECORDED 2 HOURS PRIOR TO THE LAST PRESENTED LOG
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
I was walking down the streets of this little town that we¡¯d found, doing my best to act like I was looking for a hideout when in reality, I was just keeping an eye out for when Chloe would stop trying to drill holes in our backs with her stares so I could double back to find Sarah and see how she was feeling. There was no way in hell that whatever had just happened between them could take a backseat in my mind to looking for a spot to hide so I turned a corner to break line of sight and move towards our abused chemist. As I walked, I took stock of the streets around me. This entire town seemed to be set up in a nearly perfect square grid, so visibility would have been nearly perfect in a straight line¡­ If only there weren¡¯t so many people roaming the street. Not gonna say I don¡¯t miss him, but I am kinda glad Alex isn¡¯t here, I¡¯d be drowning in short jokes right about now. I walked vaguely in the direction that I¡¯d seen Sarah walk off to, but it soon became clear that I had no idea what path she¡¯d taken, and the street¡¯s grid-like structure meant I only had a chance at spotting her if she happened to be walking down the same street as me. Asking the locals helped somewhat. They were all so friendly that it almost made me feel like someone was about to pop out of nowhere to try to sell me on some scam or another, but no, they were just friendly, cheerful, and happy to help, which was refreshing after the chaos that had been the day before. At one point, walking down a street looking for Sarah, I felt something strange, as if someone had violently forced my head to turn in another direction, only nobody was there to do that, and I wasn¡¯t actually forced to look, but the overwhelming urge to do so was so strong there was nothing else I could think of comparing it to. It didn¡¯t matter anyway, that feeling had come from where Chloe had sent us on our way and even if I didn¡¯t have something much more important to do, I didn¡¯t feel like going to see her at the moment, so I continued with my search. When I was beginning to think that I might have gotten lost, that feeling came again, only from a completely different direction. Okay, I hate that. I need to see what that was so I can get it to knock it off. Besides, if the rest also felt it and were as annoyed as me, they might also go to check it out. Decent place to meet up. So it was that I made my way through the busy streets, the pleasant simulated sunlight streaming down between the leaves of abundant trees to light up the people in the crowd as I moved by them, in hopes of finding whatever it was that was so insistent on disturbing this serene atmosphere. It didn¡¯t take long for the signs of that serene atmosphere being disturbed to make themselves apparent, as I was now walking with a clear destination in mind rather than trying to find someone I¡¯d lost track of. This came in the form of a bunch of people rushing away from what looked like a street like any other. They were coming around the corner and hurrying up to break line of sight with something, though I couldn¡¯t see what it was since I¡¯d have to turn that corner first. I¡¯m probably gonna regret this, aren''t I? I mentally prepared myself and moved to look past the street corner people were running away from like I was some sort of hero moving opposite the tide of panic, only to immediately freeze like a deer caught in headlights the second I saw the source of the commotion. It was those Guardians again. The source of all ¨Cor most of¨C our torment the last few days, were methodically walking down the street, looking for any stragglers that had been forced to hide after failing to run away from them. In hindsight, I should have expected that. There were five of them, and as my gaze scanned every member of their little pack, they eventually settled on the lead one, whose eyes met mine. Oh no¡­ With an ear piercing screech, the leader alerted its group to my presence, and I thought they would all charge me like they¡¯d shown themselves prone to do when they captured us, but instead, they opened fire. They shoot now?! I barely had time to process the many chitinous spikes that shot out of the tips of their tentacles and realize that they were coming straight for me, faster than I could ever do anything about. It took less than a second and an eternity for the first of those spikes to reach my hastily thrown up guard meant to at least cover my head and heart. I knew that it wouldn¡¯t be enough. There were too many important bits of the human body that I could not hope to cover all at once. In that eternity between instants that I had, I made the decision to use whatever time I¡¯d have left to run away in the opposite direction to where our little group had split, so they wouldn¡¯t be caught without help like I¡¯d been. The least I could do was do everything in my power to make sure they¡¯d- OW! Ugh! That¡¯s so annoying! I thought, as my spiraling thoughts were broken by what felt like pebbles impacting the mesh of my equipment and failing to penetrate, or even do much of anything. Opening my eyes, I saw that the hail of spikes they had thrown at me had mostly reached me¡­ Only to bounce off and leave only a small bruise, if even that. ¡°Huh.¡± I said, picking up one of those discarded forearm length spikes. The leader made another ear-piercing shriek, but still none of them charged and they even stopped firing their spikes at me. This group was a far cry from the monsters that had overpowered and taken us prisoner just yesterday. Although, thinking about it, it made some sense. This was supposed to be a Class-7 world. One of those low gravity gardenworlds where the locals are physically weaker to match. What was strange was that they had some monsters that could give us so much trouble instead of failing to do so. That had been the whole reason why the GF had wanted to send a group made up entirely of humans to this planet, to get some ¡®crazy strong deathworlders¡¯ to investigate where others had failed. So if the ones that got us were abnormal elites, that would make you lot¡­ The rank and file. With the galaxy finally making some sense again, I rushed forwards, and with an open palm, pushed the lead creature, who collapsed on contact and I fell on it, feeling a sickening crack as I miscalculated my speed and ended up placing most of my body weight on the hand that had accidentally pinned the thing to the ground. It squirmed for a second, and then it stopped moving. ¡°Huh.¡± I said once again, the events that had just occurred catching up to me. I felt sick, having done something like that with my bare hands- wait, no. These were the same things that had very nearly done the same to all of us just a day ago. They were the reason we were in this fucked up situation, with half of our group missing entirely and the other half having to keep an eye over our shoulders for a leader gone mad. With a clearer head, I brandished the spike I had picked up and threw it like a javelin, catching another of those repulsive abominations squarely in the chest. ¡°Bring it motherfuckers, I¡¯m not scared of you!¡± I called out, getting no small amount of satisfaction at the way the tables had turned from our last encounter. They did not, in fact, bring it, those motherfuckers, and instead started running away. Vicious when they have the upper hand but cowards at the first sign of resistance. I chased them. They run as fast as their legs, accustomed to life in low gravity, could carry them. I was faster. One by one, I caught them, and as though they were made of wet cardboard, they died almost immediately. I chased them down to some disgusting nest of horrors, where the last remaining member of the formerly five strong group was pounding on a literal green sphincter protruding out of the wall of some random street shop. As the pounding on the taut membrane reached its peak, the thing opened ¨Cor I guess unclenched would be a better descriptor¨C and the monster made to rush inside it, but not before I reached it and smashed it against the side of the hole it had been trying to crawl into. I¡¯d thought that would be it, but apparently there was still one more on them inside of this whatever nest. More than any of the others, I hoped this one would try to charge me so I wouldn¡¯t have to chase it inside that damp, dark and disgusting place, but it was not to be, so as it ran further inside, I went after it. Catching the last survivor hadn¡¯t been any harder than the others, but I only ended up managing it after having run deep into the tube-like passage that lay beyond the weird sphincter. Thinking about it, I began to wonder if I was not inside some weird alien¡¯s rectum, but as I looked around, reality proved itself much worse. This place was vile. Alive in all the ways that nothing should ever be. Everywhere I looked, there was some part of the surroundings reaching out for me and trying to push me away. It was so offensively wrong that I simply could not find a way to describe it. I tried to retrace my steps to get out of there as soon as possible but I could literally see my surroundings rearranging themselves before my eyes, passages opening and collapsing in a macabre fountain of gore that were all as disgusting as they were unique. Well, if that¡¯s how it¡¯s gonna be¡­ No way in hell I¡¯m staying here for a second longer than I need to. So, thoroughly grossed out but with that feeling gradually being overpowered by a building rage at whatever this was trying to keep me here, I began looking for my way out. Or failing that, trying to make one. All while doing as much damage as possible to whatever this cursed thing I was inside of was. I punched, kicked, tore and clawed at the walls that seemed insistent on trying to box me in until I saw light peeking through a spot on a wall, a membrane that was thinner than the rest. Faster than I could even form a coherent thought, I rushed towards that and came out to the street I had been in before diving into that realm of nightmares. I took a second to catch my breath, but only that long, as three more of the fuckers had somehow showed up. For fuck¡¯s sake, where do they even keep coming from?! In the same way as before, I charged what looked like the leader of the creatures, a big, fat, ugly thing that was an affront on the senses just by existing. When I was close enough, I jumped and O????o???????f?????. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. [DATA CORRUPTED] Coming to, I found myself pinned under the thing¡¯s foot, the pressure from its overly huge body weight almost as much as the pressure of my eye trying to jump right out of its socket. ¡°Ow, what the hell did that thing even do to me?¡± I was no stranger to getting punched in the face but this was extreme. Reaching towards it, I found something disgustingly soft, flimsy and crunchy where my cheekbone should be, and I had no doubt that I would be feeling that when the adrenalin wore off. If I can stay alive long enough¡­ There was very little I could do from my position lying flat on my back against something that could hit that hard, so I settled for looking around to see if I could use something to distract that giant creature. To my surprise, I wasn¡¯t disappointed. ¡°That¡¯s them, officer, please help!¡± I saw some old lady talking to a police officer, who saw my struggle and was quick to call for backup. Huh. I might just make it after al- Ow! FUCK! Just as hope was beginning to build in my heart, that big piece of shit kicked me in the face and ran away. Luckily I had my head turned, so I took the kick on the other side of the head that that thing had hit just earlier, but it was still painful. As I lay there, it didn¡¯t take long for me to begin to hear the wailing of sirens, both police and ambulances, creating a cacophony that seemed to shake the very streets. The same police officer who the old lady had been talking to came to look over me, practically a boy no older than twenty. ¡°Hey! Stay with me! You¡¯re going to be fine!¡± He said, only somewhat helpfully. ¡°Ow. I KNOW!¡± I said, more aggressively than I¡¯d intended to, sending a lance of pain through the remains of my cheek. As far as I knew, the worst damage I¡¯d taken were the hits to my face, which, while concerning, the fact that I was conscious at all was a good sign that I¡¯d live through it if I didn¡¯t do anything stupid like yelling at a poor young man just trying to do his job. Eventually some doctors came to look at me and the boy went away to do his job somewhere else. They covered my eyes and placed something on my face. The sensation was indescribable. It was something like a damp cloth, cold, but comforting. Caring. It somehow even felt alive and the realisation only made it appear that much more tender. Within minutes I was up and about. ¡°That should be enough for now, don¡¯t get in more trouble than usual and you should be fine.¡± Said the doctor, apparently done with my treatment. ¡°Wait, that''s it? What even was that?¡± I asked, completely stupefied. There must have been some sort of medical breakthrough that I¡¯d missed, because as far as I knew there was no sapient being that had a method to treat these kinds of injuries with such speeds. Bringing a hesitant hand towards the wreck of my cheekbone, I was not met with a painful soup of displaced flesh and broken bone, but with some small cuts and mild irritation over a practically intact bone structure. ¡°Well, we take great pride in our ability to heal here at-¡± I was halfway through getting my answer when something else came to the forefront of my mind. ¡°Wait! That thing was not normal! Did you see where it went?!¡± I asked. The doctor pointed off in the distance and I was gone. The thing that hit me was completely different from all the others. Most of them were almost a typical gardenworlder but that one was insanely strong, and now it had who knows how many police officers throwing themselves at it without knowing what they were up against, I needed to warn them at the very least! I followed the trail of screams, moving as fast as I possibly could before finally catching up to where the chaos had moved. Dozens of officers were practically throwing themselves at the beast in an attempt to at least slow it down so it could be restrained but it in turn responded with a hail of spikes that did far more damage than the ones I¡¯d been pelted with. I took a second to gather my thoughts and assess the situati- I???t???''???s??? ???g???e???t???t???i???n???g??? ???a???w???a???y???!??? I charged at it as fast as I could, paying as little attention as possible to the spikes it shot and dug into my skin, covering my face and chest with my arms in a mad dash to-
[SUBJECT COMPROMISED. MEMORY RECORDING STOPPED]
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°Please, you need to calm down! We¡¯re all here for you!¡± Sarah was still pleading with her boyfriend as he devolved into ever more insane spasming before our eyes. Eventually, as I noticed him pass a hand over his face, leaving behind four straight gashes leaking greenish brown ichor, I knew I had to do something drastic to grab his attention. I grabbed her shoulder and forcefully shoved her behind me, causing her to stumble and fall on her ass. ¡°Oi! Eyes on me!¡± I yelled, unsure if he could even understand me. The reaction I got was instantaneous. Immediately, his panic attack seemed to be entirely forgotten, along with all reason as he reared up with a roar that shook the very walls of our cave and charged me with murder in his now otherwise empty eyes. I got the strangest sense of d¨¦j¨¤ vu as I watched someone much larger than myself running for me thinking he could get me just like that. It called back to that last sparring match I¡¯d had with Alex before leaving the dirtball of a world we¡¯d been stationed in, and despite the fact that Curt had watched the whole thing, I saw no recognition in his gaze, so I decided to handle the situation the same way. This time, however, I could not afford to be so gentle. Moving forward with measured steps to intercept his charge at just the right moment, I brandished the spike I still held in my right hand and used it to smash his right knee the moment the corresponding foot made contact with the ground, causing it to bend in entirely the wrong direction and the big lug to come stumbling down. Now it was simply a matter of using his crippled mobility to come up behind him and- Is that an eyeball? SHIT! I only had time to curse inwardly before the arm I¡¯d been about to use to wrap around his neck and subdue him was grabbed by one of the tentacles poking out of his back, easily lifting my whole body weight in the reduced gravity and tossing me through the walls of the cave, which gave way as it turned out they were barely a curtain of some green flesh-like material hiding another chamber. I quickly hid from his view to gather my thoughts in the time I had since he seemed to have lost track of me after blindly tossing me through a wall. Two things I wish I didn¡¯t have to know: One, this place is bigger than I thought. Two, he has eyes on the back of his head. If I¡¯d thought I¡¯d already seen enough disgusting things since getting on this space tree, apparently the universe disagreed, as just as I¡¯d swung behind him I saw an eyeball, poking unnaturally out of the back of his head slightly up and to the side, swivel in its undersized socket to meet mine. It was the same brown iris on a black sclera as his regular eyes had become, but that sclera was especially noticeable as the eye protruded from his head like a large pilar cyst caught between his skull and what had been the skin of his scalp. Given its position slightly to the side of his skull rather than directly behind, I had to assume he¡¯d have another one keeping watch on the other side. Three, the knee I smashed is already doing better. As I snuck a glance past the wreck of what had been the wall of the cave, I noticed his gait was already almost back to normal, only barely favoring his intact left leg over his smashed right. He had wrapped his tentacles around the injured knee to act as some sort of a brace. Hopefully that would mean I wouldn¡¯t have to deal with them covering his back next time. Four, I thought, grumbling internally at there being too many unknowns in this fight that required my full attention, he definitely knocked something loose just now. Reaching a hand up, I groped around the inside of my suit where something was poking at my neck. Not painfully, but definitely annoyingly, plus it was important that I figure out what it was, so I didn¡¯t later find out it was part of something vital that had been rendered unusable. That would have to wait, though, as I had a friend to knock some sense into. Taking a chance on another look into the main section of the cave where everyone was still waiting, I noticed Curt had turned his back on me in his blind search. I almost took that opportunity to pounce on him then and there, but stopped myself at the memory of the unnatural eye that had caught me last time. It was clear that I wouldn¡¯t be able to sneak up on him without trying something arguably stupid given his near 360 degree field of vision, so, armed with two spikes, I threw one of them to stick itself into the floor in front of him. As I¡¯d hoped, he turned his head downwards onto the spike that had suddenly materialized before him, leaving his additional eyes to point straight up and, much like Alex before him, his own large frame worked against him as it covered my approach until it was already too late. With a leap assisted by the low artificial gravity of this place, I reached around his face to place my remaining spike against his throat and pulled with all my might. I had no hope of trying to place him in a headlock and come out unscathed with his additional limbs so instead I bent the polymer stick around his neck until it constricted the passage of air to his lungs and jumped off. And not a moment too soon, as he immediately forgot about the damage to his knee and tried to reach me with all of the limbs at his disposal. I watched him flailing wildly from my landing spot, at the same time trying to reach me and get rid of the thing stealing his breath, yet failing at both. The former because it had become significantly easier to avoid him now that he had something draining both his energy and his attention, and the latter because, try as he might, he could not get his hands between his throat and the unforgiving loop of polymer and in his panic, he hadn¡¯t noticed the loose ends of it that protruded near the back of his head. It didn¡¯t take long for him to collapse in exhaustion. I walked up to him, still wary of an errant swipe but also ready to jump in to remove the thing choking him before it could do any permanent damage. ¡°So, can we use our words like adults now?¡± I asked the prone man, but didn¡¯t get an answer before someone else broke into what I¡¯d hoped would be a conversation before it could even begin. ¡°Captain, what the hell was that?!¡± Came Sarah¡¯s irate yell. Alice was trying to gently hold her back but she was having none of it. ¡°You didn¡¯t need to go that far!¡± ¡°Now, wait a second. I know what this looks like,¡± I started in an attempt to calm her down but had to stop myself to stifle a wince at my unfortunate phrasing, as I was reminded that I did not, actually, know what it looked like to her with how their view of the world was warped to be only barely recognizable. ¡°But I have it under control. I¡¯m not gonna let him really get hurt, I just need him relaxed.¡± I finished. ¡°How can you even say that after-... Wait, you¡¯re serious? NOW?!¡± Sarah said, but that last wasn¡¯t actually aimed at me but at the prone figure beside me. ¡°Fuck me, I don¡¯t even know anymore.¡± She grumbled before walking away. In my confusion, I turned to Alice to find out what had just happened, who was quick to clarify with one of her tiny smiles. ¡°He believes you¡¯re you now¡± Heh. There was something refreshingly simple about dealing with our group¡¯s two muscle heads ¨CCurt and Alex¨C. It had gotten to the point where any of us could identify the others by the way their fist impacted our faces, and I knew I could count on him to recognize my particular brand of ass-kicking. For all the three¡¯s perception of the world had been warped, it was the familiar things that were best suited to ground them in reality. The real reality, as opposed to what they saw. In Sarah''s case, it had been a reminder of past events, traumatic as they were. For Alice, it had been the same, plus a reminder of the people who cared about her. For Curt it was showing him something he¡¯d recognize no matter how twisted the world around him became. I quickly walked up to him and grabbed the entangled tips of the polymer stick stealing away his breath and by bracing my foot against one of them, pulled as hard as I could to remove it before he¡¯d really pass out. ¡°There you are, all better now. Good thing you came to your senses when you did, your brain already doesn¡¯t get enough oxygen as it is.¡± I said, walking away as I struggled to bend my spike back mostly straight, unsubtly exposing my back to him but subtly keeping my eye on Alice¡¯s reactions in case he tried something. Her soft giggles led me to believe my fears were unfounded. ¡°She called you dumb.¡± She said, and with a grunt I heard Curt, who had just finished standing back up, turn his head to look down at me, the knee I¡¯d smashed apparently no longer bothering him. ¡°What did he say?¡± I asked her. ¡°No, you.¡± She answered, still giggling. ¡°Right, I could¡¯ve guessed that.¡± I grumbled goodnaturedly before turning into a more unpleasant topic. ¡°So, we really need to do the thing¡­¡± I said, pointing at the back of my neck, ¡°...Like, as soon as possible. Think you can convince him to play along?¡± Alice quickly turned serious and, unfortunately, silent. Whatever conversation was going on, it was clear I wouldn¡¯t be privy to, but after a short while and an exasperated grunt, the massive beast that Curt had become kneeled down beside me, exposing the nape of his neck for me to mercilessly smash. Which I did. To no reaction. This worried me more than anything I¡¯d seen today, as the other two times I¡¯d hit the thing that was infecting their perception, the consequences had been grossly spectacular. But this time, nothing. He didn¡¯t even flinch. Concerned, I hit him again, this time with the blunt spine of my slightly twisted spike, which still did nothing, and then one last time, causing the abused stick to bend with the strike around his neck but still not getting the gross reaction I wanted. I was beginning to despair, when Curt signaled for me to stop with an open hand, before driving his own spiked tentacle into the back of his head. I stood stunned at this gruesome sight, but the man that had just stabbed himself spat out a tiny glob of unrecognizable gunk before turning his inhuman face to me and flashing me a thumbs up. Yeah, I have no idea how to respond to this. Chapter 12: Life is a game of telephone.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: CHLOE PAXTON SPEC: CAPTAIN
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+13 DAYS TO MISSION START
¡°So¡­ Now what?¡± Alice asked all present, saving me from the extremely awkward position I¡¯d found myself in after the man at my feet had stabbed himself and seemed to silently ask for my approval. ¡°Now, we rest. None of you should be getting any worse anymore and it¡¯s been a day.¡± I told her, my own exhaustion starting to catch up to me as the adrenalin slowly wore off. In truth, I had no way to know if their ¡®condition¡¯, for lack of a better word, would continue to get worse, their view of reality more and more warped to the point of unrecognizability, but with no better options I had no choice but to act on the hope that whatever parasite I¡¯d seen trying to dig into their brains had been rendered inert for the time being. There would definitely have to be some in depth studies done once we could get out of this goddamn space tree to see if the effects it had already had on them could be reversed but there was no way that could be anything other than a future problem. Onto more immediate concerns, however, I turned my attention to whatever it was that had been poking at my neck uncomfortably since I¡¯d been tossed through a wall. I tried to fiddle with the collar of my suit as best I could but no matter how hard I tried, I could not find whatever it was that was causing the annoying sensation, much less even begin to try and fix it. After a good few minutes of awkwardly trying, I turned to my trio of companions. ¡°Hey, I think something¡¯s wrong with my suit, could any of you try to have a look and see if you can spot what¡¯s poking me?¡± I asked while still pulling at the offending equipment¡¯s collar, and was met with a resounding silence. ¡°What suit? You¡¯re not wearing anything that I can tell.¡± Alice answered, looking dumbfounded for a second before her expression turned downcast. Curt had predictably stayed silent, sitting on his knees as he slowly recovered from having stabbed himself, being tended to by an also silent Sarah, who hadn¡¯t even acknowledged the question. ¡°Right. Shit.¡± I muttered to myself. In my focus on a different task, it had slipped my mind that the way they looked like to me ¨Clike humanoid Guardians almost indistinguishable from the ones that had chased and imprisoned us, and missing all the equipment they¡¯d been carrying when we first left our pod¨C was also the way I looked like to them, and even if we had, to some extent, gotten over the confusing and disturbing effect it had when trying to interact with each other in any way, no amount of care and logical thinking could get past the very real limitations that such a discrepancy in what each of us perceived had when it came to more delicate operations. ¡°Sarah, think you could¡­?¡± I turned with little hope, still pointing around my neck, to the only person present other than myself who could see me the way I was rather than as some freaky alien abomination. ¡°What was that? Oh, I guess I could take a look, but then again¡­¡± Sarah spoke up, at first distractedly, being broken out of whatever silent conversation was going on between her and Curt, and though her first words gave me some hope that she could help out, she finished by raising a single finger tipped in a wicked looking curved talon. ¡°This looks like a normal finger to me, and after everything that¡¯s happened I don¡¯t know if it would be safe to go poking around your neck with it.¡± ¡°Probably best not to.¡± I once again muttered under my breath. It was looking like the only way I could properly take a look at it would be by stripping out of my suit entirely, its design meant to securely encapsulate the wearer¡¯s body having left little room for modularity, and having already spent more time than I¡¯d ever care for climbing, crawling and being tossed through surfaces coated in the ever present slime of this space tree, I was not willing to take off my protective equipment and risk having it get into more places where it wasn¡¯t wanted. ¡°Well, nothing to it, I guess. I¡¯ll look at it with fresh eyes later, but for now, I¡¯m exhausted.¡± I spoke to no one in particular with feigned nonchalance, then picked a random spot on the floor indistinguishable from any other to lie down in. ¡°Wait, you¡¯re just gonna sleep there?¡± Came a question from Alice just as I was getting comfortable. ¡°Yeah, why?¡± I asked back, not opening my eyes. ¡°This is an apartment.¡± She told me, her seemingly mundane statement punctuated with the slightest trembling of her voice that she did her best to hide. ¡°There¡¯s beds over there.¡± ¡°Really? Where?¡± To answer my question, she simply walked towards the wall I¡¯d made a hole in and then¡­ Did something. The best I could describe it would be that she squeezed through a tiny orifice in the wall, so small that it had been invisible until I looked for it, which expanded as she went to accommodate her passage, tightly hugging her body the whole way but offering no resistance that I could notice. Her action was then mimicked by the other two and, were it not for the large hole in the wall I had been tossed through and through which I could now see the trio on the other side, I would have thought I¡¯d been left completely alone in the cave I¡¯d taken over. Naturally, rather than doing whatever that was, I simply stepped through the much larger opening in the damaged membrane that passed for a wall in this cave, apparently. ¡°Pfft, couldn¡¯t go through the door like a normal person?¡± Alice asked me with a chuckle from where she lay on a spot on the floor that looked exactly like any other. ¡°Absolutely not.¡± I told her, trying to hide my true thoughts with a bit of humor. ¡°That the bed?¡± I asked her, and at her nod, I simply collapsed next to her, all energy for the day completely spent. Alice laughed faintly and proceeded to wrap me around in her arms as well as her¡­ not arms. It was something I could have done without, especially since, much like everything else in this tree, the three people with me were absolutely covered in the pervasive slime that I would rather not be also coated in, but between her recovering but still unstable mood and my lack of energy, I simply refrained from commenting. ¡°You look comfortable.¡± Quirking an eye open, I saw Sarah¡¯s slightly amused face after having made that comment. She had walked away from Curt, who sat with his back against the opposite ¡®wall¡¯ to us, and she then took a seat next to me and opposite Alice. ¡°Can¡¯t complain.¡± I lied. Her response was a half smile that didn¡¯t let me know if she had noticed or not. ¡°How¡¯re you feeling?¡± I asked her softly, keeping my movements to the absolute minimum. ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡± She started. ¡°Scared¡­ Confused¡­ Mostly tired, I guess. And worried for the future.¡± It didn¡¯t take a genius to figure out that she needed to vent to someone, and it fell on me to listen to her. ¡°I mean, I¡¯m trying to figure out how it¡¯s all gonna go if we manage to get back home. I look at us and I feel like it¡¯s all gonna be fine, but then I remember it¡¯s not fine and we¡¯re not how we look, and then I look at Curt and all he¡¯s been through in just a few hours and what everyone¡¯s gonna think about it, if they even take the time to listen to us and don¡¯t just shoot us on sight thinking we¡¯re just some other Guardians¡­¡± On she went for at least a few minutes, airing her fears and concerns, both present and future, until I saw an opening to interrupt her downward emotional spiral. ¡°When.¡± I said firmly with whatever dregs of energy I could drag from my tired body. ¡°What?¡± She asked, dumbfounded, seeming to have forgotten about my presence with her emotional turmoil. ¡°You said ¡®if we get back home¡¯, not ¡®when¡¯. It should be ¡®when¡¯.¡± I told her, grabbing and gently squeezing her hand that had landed just within reach of mine as I lay in the sort of flesh cocoon that Alice had wrapped me up in. The woman had studiously avoided being part of the conversation from the start and now if she was only pretending to be asleep, then I could honestly say she had me fooled. It took a while for Sarah to gather her thoughts enough to understand what I¡¯d pointed at, but eventually she did, and they almost immediately began to spiral again. ¡°Right, sure, but that¡¯s all besides the point. What happens when we do meet the others? How do we explain all that happened? Hell, can we even explain-?¡± ¡°You keep assuming the worst.¡± I once again interrupted her ramblings. ¡°Are you forgetting that I¡¯m still here? And I don¡¯t think I¡¯m flying off the handle coming to crazy conclusions and treating you all like monsters, am I?¡± ¡°No, but-¡± ¡°But nothing, I¡¯ve said it before and I¡¯ll keep saying it as many times as it takes. I know who you are and I¡¯ll be damned if I let anyone make a fuss about it when we all get home, are we clear?¡± ¡°Right¡­ Thanks Captain.¡± She said, and we fell into companionable silence with another gentle squeeze of her hand held in mine, which she reciprocated shortly after. ¡°Feeling better?¡± I asked her once her breathing had calmed down. ¡°Yeah, I guess I am.¡± She said with a sigh. ¡°Good, cause I can see someone who could definitely use some kind words.¡± I told her, pointing with my gaze at Curt, the rest of my body still mostly immobilized. Sarah, it seemed, needed no further instructions as she let go of my hand and went to take her place next to the former pipsqueak turned goliath. In truth, throughout that entire conversation, I had been eyeing him somewhat nervously, as he had been¡­ jumpy. He¡¯d had this subtle twitch to his arms and legs every time I said a word and every other time that Sarah spoke that made it seem like he¡¯d been ready to pounce on us at any moment, and given what I¡¯d been told about what he¡¯d been up to, it wouldn¡¯t surprise me if he had been. That, even more than the grip Alice had me in, was the main reason why I¡¯d gone out of my way to avoid making any sort of movements, as I was painfully aware that any action I took to try and help might be perceived as something else. As it was, I could only hope that Sarah would be able to put his worries to rest. Without warning, I received a gentle, full-body squeeze from the flesh cocoon Alice had encased me in, before quickly relaxing back to its previous position. The small gesture let me know that she had absolutely been faking her sleep the whole time, but also that she appreciated my actions and my willingness to stand by my previous promise to her in spite of everything that had happened, the simplicity of it enough to transcend the bizarre nature of our situation and ensure the meaning carried through. And with that, I passed out into blissful slumber.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+14 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
I awoke next to Curt where we lay on the bed we¡¯d appropriated in this little apartment, in the same room up against the opposite wall where Alice had picked her own large bed to sleep in, and Chloe, despite being invited to share that bed, had passed out on the floor next to it for some reason. Being the first to come to consciousness, I got a great view of Curt¡¯s shuttered eyes, slowly, tentatively, beginning to open ever so slightly as he roused from his sleep. ¡°G¡¯morning.¡± I gently whispered to him. He snored in my face. Right, completely misread that, I guess. Honestly, I wasn¡¯t even mad. This bit of mundanity had been just what I needed after the emotionally exhausting day that yesterday had been, so, taking care to move as slowly as possible to avoid waking him for real this time, I began the careful process of getting out of bed. ¡°H¡¯wa¡­? S¡¯morning already?¡± Curt asked halfway through a snore. Evidently I hadn¡¯t managed to move without waking him. Rather than answer, I just shot him a smile and his response was to grab me by the hip and pull me back beside him before promptly trying to fall back asleep while hugging me like I was some giant stuffed animal. It was small things like this that made everything worth it, and that energized me so I could get ready to tackle the events of the coming da- Right, shit. We need to do some things today. The events of the last few days and what they meant going forward suddenly came rushing to the forefront of my mind where they threatened to immediately crush my rising mood. Fortunately they didn¡¯t quite manage it, but they did manage to sober me up enough to pull myself out of bed and into full wakefulness, despite much groaning coming from beside me. ¡°Morning.¡± Alice said groggily from where she was just beginning to come to consciousness. As she did, she let go of the captain, whom she¡¯d held onto from the edge of her bed throughout the night, causing her to stir, and immediately bolt upright the instant her eyes cracked open. Everybody froze for a second as Chloe¡¯s fight or flight response cycled and after an awkwardly long second, she came fully to her senses and recognized the people around her. ¡°Right¡­ Sorry everyone, and good morning.¡± She greeted everyone lamely, a bit of tired embarrassment leaking through her tone. That and the visible bags under her eyes made it clear that her sleep hadn¡¯t been as restful as mine, yet in typical Chloe fashion, she quickly rallied and filled her body language, if not her face, with the energy we associated with her. I was about to return her greeting when I was stopped by a scream from behind me. ¡°Shit!¡± Curt yelled, panicked at seeing and hearing the captain first thing in the morning, and in that instant I was already there to try and calm him down. ¡°Shh. Hey! It¡¯s not what it looks like. We talked about this, remember?¡± I told him from where I¡¯d positioned myself to cover his entire field of vision. Unable to see what had scared him, he slowly recovered, taking deep breaths to calm himself down, an effort that was almost immediately ruined as the captain called out. ¡°What was that?¡± She said, almost reigniting Curt¡¯s panic attack. ¡°Nothing!¡± I told her. ¡°Didn¡¯t seem like nothing¡­¡± She grumbled. ¡°Ok. Ok¡­ I¡¯m ok.¡± Curt told me, speaking softly. ¡°See?!¡± I asked the captain over my shoulder. ¡°See what?¡± ¡°Nothing!¡± Ugh. This is gonna get old very fast. Still, annoying as it was, leaving Curt to suffer by himself was out of the question. From what he¡¯d told me, he¡¯d been unable to look at Chloe and not see her doing something nefarious, snarling, lunging, clawing and generally attacking every time he laid eyes on her. This was regardless of whatever she actually happened to be doing at the time. In his eyes, she would always be doing something threatening, which became even scarier when he took his eyes off her for a few moments, only to turn back and see a twisted version of her like some kind of cheap horror movie jumpscare. It had apparently been something he¡¯d first began to notice at the start of their fight when he first set foot in this apartment, and hadn¡¯t stopped since. It had been a big part of why that fight had even taken place to begin with. To add onto that, for some strange reason, he had no way to actually communicate with her, and neither could she talk to him, each straight up unable to hear the other¡¯s words, so it fell on Alice and I to pass on any necessary information and de-escalate tensions that arose from whatever was messing with our senses. The whole thing was extremely concerning. Exhausting at best and dangerous at worst. It meant that, no matter how hard he tried, Curt would always have to keep his guard up around our captain, and unless she also did the same or either of them lost the presence of mind to keep track of what¡¯s what for even a second, then things could get bloody really fast. It was why it fell on me to be there for Curt to help him calm down in spite of the overstimulation his eyes fed him, while Chloe, the only one of us unaffected by whatever the pillslugs had done to us, could mostly be trusted to keep herself in check, so long as everyone remained careful. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. ¡°Right. So! Plans for today!¡± Chloe called out to everyone, this time not making Curt jump since he had mostly gotten himself together. ¡°First order of business should be to regroup with the other half of our squad. It¡¯s something that¡¯s already been put off longer than I¡¯d like so it should be priority number one. We know the shuttle is likely destroyed so chances are they¡¯d be hiding out in the pod, so we backtrack there. That done, we check on their situation and go from there. We don¡¯t really have maps anymore so we¡¯ll be going mostly blind but we don¡¯t have any other choice. Anyone have anything to add?¡± I was half tempted to make a snarky remark about having breakfast before going out but I held myself back, Chloe¡¯s serious attitude conveying that this was no time for jokes. ¡°What did she say?¡± Curt asked me, and if my humor had been restrained before, now it was shot dead. Still, I knew it wasn¡¯t his fault, so I relayed her words to him, and he made no further comments. ¡°Then out we go!¡± She ordered while injecting just a tiny bit of cheer to her voice that lifted my spirits somewhat after having been confronted with Curt¡¯s situation twice in the span of five minutes. As we all moved to the exit of the apartment and Alice walked out first, however, Chloe stopped at the door. ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± She asked, her face twisted in an expression of disgust. ¡°What¡¯s what?¡± I asked her, unsure of what was making her have such a strong reaction. Instead of answering, she just waved at everything ahead of her, which happened to be the three of us and the doorway. ¡°You mean the door?¡± Alice asked, poking her head back in, and I could swear I almost saw Chloe gag, despite her best efforts to hide it. ¡°Sure. ¡®Course it is. Well, I will be taking the other exit if you don¡¯t mind.¡± She said, moving towards the back of the apartment. I was halfway through asking what she meant when she jumped off the balcony to presumably plummet onto the streets below. ¡°Should we be worried?¡± Alice asked. ¡°Pro¡¯bly not?¡± Curt answered her, though he did not sound so sure himself. One elevator ride that seemed to stretch on forever later, we were all outside, where fortunately there were no obvious signs of where the captain had gone splat, but unfortunately there was no sign of the captain either. ¡°Ah, shit, not this again. Anyone see her?¡± Curt asked, already exasperated, looking around and above at the building behind us. ¡°No, but not what again?¡± Alice asked him, also keeping an eye out. ¡°We¡¯re split up again!¡± Curt raised his voice, causing Alice to flinch at his words. ¡°Not two steps away from where we slept and already we are in the same position that caused all our problems yesterday!¡± I¡¯d initially thought he¡¯d been dreading the prospect of losing sight of the captain and the subsequent jumpscare that would have to follow when he spotted her, but he had a point. Most of our problems had stemmed from being split up from the rest of our squad, either by choice or by force, and not even an hour into the day and we¡¯d already lost track of someone. ¡°We need to go look for her.¡± Curt grumbled a direction for what was left of our group as the acting Sub-Captain, and started to move away from the building, only to be interrupted by a voice coming from behind him as he started to march off. ¡°Where do you think you¡¯re going?¡± Came the captain¡¯s voice from a first floor balcony of the building we¡¯d exited from, which also caused Curt to let out a less than manly scream. ¡°To look for you!¡± Alice called back as the captain scaled down the outside of the building like some sort of lunatic. ¡°I¡¯m right here. Why would I be anywhere else?¡± Was her answer, and much as we all wanted to come up with a proper response to her quip, we simply settled for a short bit of silence. ¡°Right, well, first things first, we look for the pod. Now I¡¯m no navigator, but unless I¡¯m misremembering, it should be in that direction.¡± She said, pointing to her left in the direction of the building next to the one we¡¯d just exited from. ¡°You mean, down the street that way?¡± Alice asked her, pointing down the street to her right and Chloe¡¯s left. The captain, for her part, looked confused at the mention of a street before answering: ¡°Sure, but not quite, I mean towards that opening.¡± She said, still pointing towards the same building. ¡°You want us to go into another building?¡± ¡°No, just¡­ follow me.¡± She finally ordered, moving down the street in the direction Alice had pointed. ¡°So¡­ where¡¯re we going?¡± Asked Curt in a low voice, sensing the strange mood. ¡°Pod.¡± I told him succinctly. ¡°And what¡¯s this about going into a building?¡± ¡°Apparently nothing!¡± Alice grumbled somewhat loudly. ¡°What was that?¡± Chloe asked from her position in the lead of our formation. ¡°Nothing!¡± She called back. ¡°Sounded like something.¡± ¡°Well, it wasn¡¯t¡± ¡°So it wasn¡¯t nothing?¡± Curt butt in, only able to hear two thirds of the dialogue going on. ¡°No, it was!¡± ¡°Ah, then what was it?¡± Chloe asked, stopping her walk and turning around to address her. ¡°Well if it was nothing then why are we stopping?¡± Curt asked. ¡°Are we sure the pod was this way?¡± I asked, also interrupting the conversation and pulling it in an entirely different direction. ¡°Well that¡¯s what she said earlier.¡± Alice grumbled. ¡°Wait, when did that happen?¡± Curt asked her. ¡°Right after we left the apartment!¡± ¡°What did I say after leaving the apartment?¡± Chloe asked once again. ¡°Where the pod was!¡± ¡°Ok, and did you think it was somewhere else?¡± She asked sweetly. ¡°No, but Sarah asked if- Oh fuck all of you!¡± Alice said without malice, having finally caught on to our game and pouting up a storm in fake outrage that didn''t take long to crack and become one of her tiny smiles. Sharing a quick laugh at that moment of levity, we moved on. It soon became clear, however, that none of us had a good enough grasp of where the pod had ended up to be able to backtrack towards it without maps, so it didn¡¯t take long before we had to stop or risk getting completely lost. ¡°Any ideas?¡± The captain asked everyone. ¡°We could ask the locals.¡± Alice supplied after a moment of silence. ¡°Come again?¡± Chloe asked her. ¡°Well, the locals might have come across the pod, I figure it should be pretty easy to spot against the local architecture so maybe they did and we can ask them!¡± She explained, already calling out to a random man walking down the same street as us. ¡­ ¡°A space-pod, you say? Well, I don¡¯t know about that, but I do remember some commotion going on that the police were trying to clean up down on the intersection of Primrose and Honeydew Avenues, maybe that¡¯s what you¡¯re looking for?¡± The man supplied at Alice¡¯s questioning. ¡°And when did this commotion start?¡± ¡°Well it started some two weeks ago when people noticed this weird thing poking out of a wall, but it really only became a problem like two days ago when the police got involved. I think it¡¯s calmed down since then, though.¡± ¡°Right, and where can we find the intersection between Primrose and Honeydew?¡± Alice asked again, this time a little more insistently than the last time. ¡°Oh, that¡¯s easy, just walk four blocks down this road, then you¡¯ll reach Primrose, turn right and walk two more blocks and you¡¯re there.¡± ¡°Thank you, sir!¡± ¡°It was no problem at all young lady, best of luck to you.¡± ¡°Well, you heard the man, let¡¯s go!¡± I said, already starting off to follow his directions. ¡°No, I didn¡¯t, what just happened?¡± Chloe asked me, stopping me in my tracks. Right, this shit again, it¡¯s basically Curt all over again. ¡°The man told us where we could probably find the pod.¡± ¡°Come again?¡± Chloe asked again, and I just shrugged at her with my arms up in an expression that I hoped would convey ¡®I don¡¯t know what you want from me here¡¯. ¡°Ok, and where is that, then?¡± ¡°Primrose and Honeydew!¡± Alice chirped from behind me, to the captain¡¯s complete befuddlement. ¡°Are you fuckin¡¯¨C You know what, no. If you know where that is, then lead on.¡± She said, evidently done with our shit, whatever that was. ¡­ ¡°Does this look weird to any of you?¡± I asked any who would answer. ¡°What does it look like to you?¡± Chloe asked me. ¡°Well¡­ Like someone took a circular cutout off a brick wall and then filled it back up without bothering to align any of the new bricks.¡± I answered honestly. ¡°Is it any different to you?¡± ¡°No, pretty much the same. Except replace the bricks with space tree nastiness.¡± ¡°You think this is¡­?¡± ¡°Yeah.¡± I didn¡¯t need to finish my question for the captain to be ready with an answer. After all, what were the chances we¡¯d found signs of person sized, circular shaped damage on the walls of this space tree and it being unrelated to the pod with a person sized circular hatch we¡¯d used to dig a hole into this tree from space? I wanted to hold onto a hope that maybe the entrance to the pod had simply been covered and it was still there behind these bricks, but even then, the only thing out there should be the void of space, so for better or for worse, the pod and anyone who had been in it was lost to us, and with it, our last hope of getting back to our mothership and back home. ¡°Does that mean¡­ we¡¯re stuck here?¡± Alice asked weakly, her last bits of hope leaving her with every word spoken. ¡°No.¡± The captain spoke quietly, but with finality. ¡°But then how-?¡± Alice began to ask, but stopped when she noticed the captain was talking to herself and not really listening to the world around her. ¡°No, this tree has to be mobile. It has to be or they wouldn¡¯t have been able to get it into orbit in the first place. But then where do they¡­¡± Chloe continued to mutter to herself. ¡°Hey, so, is that what I think it is?¡± Curt asked from my side. ¡°Yeah.¡± ¡°Fuck.¡± ¡°Yeah.¡± ¡°Alright, new plan!¡± The captain suddenly yelled, drawing another startled scream from Curt which she ignored as if she hadn¡¯t even heard it, which, in hindsight, she probably hadn¡¯t. ¡°This tree has to be able to move, or else it never would have reached or be able to sustain a stable orbit, so if we can¡¯t take a pod or a shuttle to the mothership, then we take the tree to the mothership. We¡¯ll need to commandeer whatever way the locals have of flying it so that it can be brought close to the mothership. Once there, I can do a short space walk to hop into a shuttle and ferry you all back since none of you have any EVA suits. Any thoughts?¡± Alice and I stayed quiet for a few seconds and it took me longer than I cared to admit to realise that Curt had likely got none of that plan, so I relayed it to him. ¡°Okay, several questions.¡± He started, with me acting as an intermediary between him and Chloe. ¡°How do we know this tree can even make it to the mothership, much less move at all?¡± ¡°We don¡¯t know for sure, but it¡¯s all we¡¯ve got at the moment.¡± ¡°How are we even supposed to find whatever passes as a control room for this tree, if it even exists?¡± ¡°Ooh, there¡¯s street signs!¡± Alice interrupted me before I could even voice Curt¡¯s question. ¡°Command Center should be twelve kilometers that way-ish!¡± ¡°There are? Oh, yeah, good find.¡± Curt commented. ¡°There are? Fuck it, ¡®course there are. Anything else?¡± Chloe asked, sounding exasperated. ¡°How are we supposed to fly a gigantic alien space tree?¡± ¡°Well, it¡¯s likely we¡¯ll need the help of the locals and with everything that¡¯s happened I don¡¯t expect them to be friendly or willing to help. Since you can talk to them, that makes this whole plan at least possible in theory, but then the question becomes: Can you get these creatures that look like people to do what you want them to, by force if necessary?¡± The silence stretched on for what felt like an eternity as Alice, Curt and I processed her question. Could we threaten people into doing what we needed them to, even if they tried to resist? People who were just going about their lives and, aside from our unfortunate interactions with Guardians, had been nothing but friendly? There was no telling what kind of aliens we would find in this ¡®Command Center¡¯, so we¡¯d have to go in mentally prepared for anything, which just brought the question back around. Could we do it? It felt like something as cruel as it would be necessary, which just made the whole question all the more distasteful to even consider. ¡°If you don¡¯t think you can, then I understand. I can think of some other plan, but I need to kno-¡± ¡°We¡¯ll do it.¡± Curt interrupted our captain. ¡°We have to.¡± He spoke with finality, and with that, our decision was made.
MEMORY TRANSCRIPT LOG: SARAH DI PIETRO SPEC: CHEMIST
LOCATION: GF-C7-89573 NEAR ORBIT T+15 DAYS TO MISSION START
DATA CORRUPTION CLEANED BY TECHNICIAN UNDER NDA
The 12 kilometer walk to the command center had been mostly pleasant for most of us, but absolute hell for Chloe. While we¡¯d had time to relax in the pleasant atmosphere and take in the true scale of this space tree to let go of the tension of the previous days, Chloe¡¯s feet apparently kept getting stuck to the ground with each step for whatever reason, which was no way to travel that kind of distance, so we¡¯d made camp in an under construction building to rest for the night and tackle the command center the following day. Luckily the uninhabited nature of the spot meant we could set up with no casualties among the locals this time, which was infinitely worth the discomfort of having to sleep on hard, dirty concrete with no furniture. The following morning, we¡¯d taken some much needed time to stretch and massage our stiff backs from having slept on the floor before truly starting the day. The one exception had been Chloe, who couldn¡¯t seem to find a difference between this husk of a building and a fully furnished home, and had made a habit of sleeping on the floor besides. ¡°Well, this is it.¡± The captain spoke to us from where we stood at the gates of a skyscraper clearly labeled ¡®Command Center¡¯ by a helpful sign near its entrance. Shit, this is happening. This was a moment I¡¯d been dreading since the moment the plan was outlined. From the day we¡¯d signed up for this job, we were meant to be explorers, going out into the stars to find new places to call home. We were not meant to be police, military and most certainly not whatever this was, and yet our circumstances left us with no choice but to go through with this plan that anywhere else would be seen as criminal at best, and an act of terrorism at worst. ¡°I¡¯m hoping to avoid casualties as much as possible, but once we start breaking into places where we¡¯re not supposed to be, I can¡¯t imagine a scenario that doesn¡¯t involve some form of chaos, so heads on swivels. Let¡¯s go.¡± She ordered somewhat somberly, crushing my hopes to stall for time a little longer as we all moved into the large tower. The instant we set foot in the building, all our gazes, immediately and in perfect synch, locked on to the terrified receptionist behind a front desk. Well, all our gazes except Chloe¡¯s, who instead looked at each of us and followed our line of sight to the poor civilian before dashing towards them with a muttered curse. This almost led to Curt attempting to pounce on our captain but luckily I managed to hold him back. Alice, meanwhile, dashed after the captain who, for her part, tossed her stick at the civilian who was still paralyzed in fear. Oh no¡­ I thought as I watched the deadly projectile sail through the air. It didn¡¯t even really arc, due to the combination of the strength behind the throw and the low gravity of the environment, instead travelling in a perfectly straight line towards its destination. Perhaps for that very reason, the weapon missed its intended target, instead burying itself by the tip in the wall behind and slightly above the shocked receptionist. Chloe reached them half a heartbeat after that, but luckily so did Alice. ¡°Terribly sorry about that, I assure it won¡¯t happen again! I was just hoping to have a word with you for a moment?¡± Alice told the shaken receptionist in an attempt to de-escalate the situation while subtly holding back Chloe, who moved to retrieve her thrown stick but otherwise didn¡¯t interrupt. ¡°A-ah I see.¡± The receptionist spoke through her shock with a halting voice, before continuing more steadily. ¡°Well, if you are looking for the kennels and embracing chambers, then I¡¯m afraid you won¡¯t find any in this building-¡± ¡°Thanks, but that won¡¯t be necessary.¡± Alice interrupted. ¡°We were just hoping to bring this one to Central Command. Rare specimen, you see. We were hoping to establish communication with someone who can point us in the direction of where we could bring it to a transport hub. It¡¯s a bit too lively to be treated in Skyhaven, as I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll agree.¡± She rattled off a bunch of excuses that would hopefully sound generic enough to be believable, all while asking for access to communications and transport out of the space tree. I had to admit, I was genuinely impressed by her quick thinking. ¡°Of course, down the hall to your left, then take the elevator to the top floor, I¡¯ll make sure it¡¯s unlocked for you.¡± The receptionist said with a serious voice, apparently finding no reason to doubt Alice¡¯s words. With a few parting words and polite smiles, we departed in the direction we¡¯d been pointed to, much to Chloe¡¯s confusion. ¡°What just happened?¡± ¡°We got directions and authorization to be here.¡± I answered in place of Alice, who had deflated the moment we were away from peering eyes. ¡°One elevator ride and we¡¯ll have access to communications and transport. And we are meant to be there, so no one should bat an eye.¡± ¡°That¡¯s¡­ brilliant, actually. Although, why did you ask for communication?¡± ¡°Well¡­¡± It was Alice who answered this time. ¡°Their cities look advanced enough. I thought maybe if they had cameras or something we could use them to try and find Mike and the others before leaving.¡± She spoke shyly. The captain didn¡¯t answer. I¡¯d known her long enough to know she was glad for the opportunity to find our missing squad members but I also realized that our mission had simply gone so far off the rails that we had no choice but to prioritize getting out of here as quickly as possible, and when the time came, sge''d be the one forced to make that call. I did not envy her position at the moment. In no time at all, we were in the elevator which, despite the captain''s complaints and constant shivering all the way, carried us smoothly to the top floor, and we waited outside what was presumably some form of central command room on the other side of a pair of closed, solid steel sliding doors. The captain took a deep breath before addressing us. ¡°Well, we¡¯re here. You¡¯ve all done well to keep us out of trouble so far, but we need to take control of whatever¡¯s beyond these¡­ doors. So, things will get ugly, and likely fast. All I ask is that you keep an eye on each other, and then we¡¯ll go home. Everyone ready?¡± At our nods, she finished. ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± As she ordered, Curt opened the gates for us and we were met with a large circular room with its walls covered in monitors and computers being manned by a wide assortment of people, none of which seemed to be paying us any mind. The one that did, however, stood on a raised platform surrounded by a large circular workstation type desk covered in computers much like everything else in this command center, and standing on this central platform, was Captain Chloe Paxton. I was at a loss for words. Seemingly everyone else was too. According to our plan, we should have been making our presence and intent to commandeer this space known, and yet nobody said a word. ¡°Can I help you?¡± Chloe asked from her spot on the central platform. ¡°You again. I hope for your sake that you are feeling more cooperative this time.¡± Another Chloe, the one we¡¯d walked in here with, spoke from beside me. Her doppelganger didn¡¯t answer, a silent conversation occurring between them through their glares. ¡°As planned, we¡¯re taking over this facility! Keep everything contained while I deal with that fucker!¡± The Chloe that stood next to us ordered, followed shortly by the other one: ¡°Well, what are you waiting for? Capture that creature!¡± And all hell broke loose. It was only because we had gone over our roles beforehand that Curt, Alice and I knew what to do while the Chloes dealt with each other. We were to make sure no alarms were raised or unknown defense systems activated, and we did just that, rounding up the occupants of this room, none of which were combatants so it wasn¡¯t a difficult task, and collecting them in isolated groups that were as large as we could confidently manage. While we were doing that, they didn¡¯t even try to stop us, just looking at us and the Chloes with scared, confused and betrayed expressions, and often pleading with us to see reason and let them go. We didn¡¯t. For all that our task was viscerally disturbing, it was glancing at where the Chloes fought each other that grounded us enough to see the necessity of it. Where one Chloe was a whirlwind of controlled violence, the other stumbled after every step. One would lash out occasionally with measured and impactful strikes while the other would flail around wildly, achieving little of note. It didn¡¯t take having watched many of Curt, Alex and Chloe¡¯s ¡®sparring sessions¡¯ to figure out who the impostor was, and the infuriating thought that someone could try to pass themselves as someone I respected to try to give me orders was enough to erase any doubts in my otherwise extremely questionable actions. From what I could see, the other two seemed to be thinking the same, as none of them made any move to interrupt the fight or release their captives. It didn¡¯t take long for the fight going on in the center of the room to come to an end, with the obvious impostor being knocked back with a spike dug into her shoulder. ¡°So, I¡¯ve asked this once before and I will only ask this one more time. Who are you working for? On whose orders are you acting?¡± Chloe spat. ¡°Is that¡­?¡± Alice asked tentatively and received an answer before she¡¯d even finished her question. ¡°Yeah, this is the one in charge of the monsters that captured us, and the one that did¡­ whatever it was, to all of you.¡± Chloe told her, not once taking her eyes off her doppelganger''s prone form. ¡°What are you doing, you traitors?! Stop gawking and capture this thing!¡± The impostor roared at us, once more trying to use her stolen face to get us to follow its orders, and once more being met with silence. ¡°Traitors? You think they¡¯ve ever been yours?¡± Chloe mocked her doppelganger. For her part, the fake didn¡¯t give her a proper answer and instead just growled. ¡°Please,¡± Chloe said with a mocking laugh. ¡°You can change our bodies, twist our view of the world so it¡¯s barely recognizable, even try to turn us against each other, but you don¡¯t get to take away our humanity. And as humans, we take care of our own. None of them would ever follow you after what you¡¯ve done.¡± She delivered with finality. Her copy continued to growl all throughout her short speech, and finally exploded with rage once it was done. ¡°You aliens are all the same! You come into our homes, attack our people, refuse enlightenment and even now you still stand against the march of progress! Well, I¡¯ll be damned if I let you continue to run rampant through my Skyhaven. Fuck. YOU!¡± She yelled and then slapped her hand on a console on her desk that she¡¯d been knocked against, and my world went upside down. I¡¯d been standing one second, the next, I was flying. Up and down lost its meaning, air escaped my lungs, and the only thing I could tell for certain was that I needed to hold on or I would be lost forever. A dark mass approached me, its solid black coloring contrasted against the background spotted by the stars, and as I crashed into it, I grabbed on desperately with every limb at my disposal. To let go was to die, of that I was certain. After taking several seconds to slow my heart and steady my breathing, I tentatively started to take in my surroundings. I was¡­ In a field at nighttime? That was the only conclusion I could reach. The dirt plains around me, utterly devoid of vegetation or signs of civilization, seemed to stretch out as far as the eye could see in every direction, while the light of the stars overhead was just barely enough to see by. ¡°Curt?! Alice?! Are you there?!¡± I called out into the darkness. ¡°Here!¡± I soon heard Alice¡¯s voice, and it didn¡¯t take me long to see her approaching in the distance. ¡°Shit! I need help!¡± This time it was Curt¡¯s voice, and he sounded panicked. He also sounded close, and after a quick search, I spotted him, crouched not far from where I¡¯d ended up, so I immediately made my way to his position. ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± I asked once I was close enough. ¡°It¡¯s Chloe! I don¡¯t know what¡¯s wrong with her but she¡¯s not moving!¡± He said, and true enough, he held the unconscious form of our captain in his arms. ¡°Shit! Is she injured?! Captain, wake up!¡± I yelled, my panic rising as I looked her over, unable to find anything wrong other than the fact that she was unresponsive. In the back of my mind, I barely registered Alice¡¯s approaching steps, but I was too focused on trying to get the captain to wake up to pay her any mind, gently slapping her and shaking her to see if she showed any signs of life. I was aware that that was not something that should be done to an unconscious person, but now wasn¡¯t the time for such considerations. We were in hostile territory, reeling from some kind of unknown trap, we needed her awake and aware yesterday! ¡°Oh, no¡­¡± Alice mumbled from behind me, but was ignored. It was as I was in the middle of my increasingly panicked attempts to get her to wake up that something finally happened. Hundreds of tiny glass shards erupted from the collar of her suit, and gently floated off into the distance, heedless of gravity. I didn¡¯t know what to make of that, so I turned to the nearest person, Curt, who looked just as confused as me. I then felt Alice calling my attention with a poke on my shoulder, and turned to see her pointing at the empty night sky. Only, it wasn¡¯t empty, as dominating the skyline was the cloudy yellow sphere that was the pillslugs'' homeworld. The meaning of this came crashing like a freight train into my mind. ¡°But how is¡­? But then¡­?¡± I mumbled uselessly, and Alice finished voicing my thoughts, already sniffling and tears forming in her eyes. ¡°Her EVA suit failed to deploy. She¡¯s gone.¡±