Neo Chronicles: Black Void
Episode 23: Left Behind
Table of Contents
I'm spotted as soon as I bolt in the door. Greeted by all manner of plasma, laser—shoot, I think there's a few shelled shots in the mix, too. The sword's big enough to almost cover all of me, but even the few strays that end up hittin' me, barely leave a scratch. Good ol' super durability. I love my ST. And none of the shots are makin' me black out like before. Good stuff.
While I'm running in, Ran decides to use me as cover to get around and start up whatever sneak attack she's got up her sleeve. Carlos continues his tactic of teleport, shoot, teleport. Shots fired every which way. Miniature explosions bursting out. I don't care though. Right now, the only thing that matters is fighting these fools off.
I push my way to the middle of the crowd, swinging my sword all around me as I do a spinning type motion. The aliens do their best to duck and roll away. Then I start to pull out the big stuff. All that energy that got stored up? This sword is glowin'. Pulsatin' every few half seconds.
With the next swing, I shoot off a blue burst of light. Nothing too drastic, but the blast is enough to knock two of the aliens down at once. They ain't movin' after that. I guarantee you. I turn around, and fire another blast at the aliens there. The three of them fall out, too.
Next thing I know, a laser barely misses my cheek bone. I turn to the door an' see that their calvery's arrived. Must be dang near every single pirate who boarded the ship fallin' in this room now. Word musta got out they was gettin' they tails beat.
These pirates is free. I'm jus' runnin' on autopilot now. Block their attacks with the sword. Charge in at 'em. Strike 'em down. One by one, two by two, three by three. They all fall. I'm so caught up in my swingin', I barely notice Ran transforming into this huge two headed dragon lookin' thing. Bitin' off people's heads, crushin' folks with her tail. Gettin' pretty gruesome on her end. And Carlos? That dude is like on another level with his marksmanship. You wouldn't know if he ran outta ammo or not, cuz as soon as he unloads a clip, he teleports right next to the dude he was shootin', breaks an arm, breaks a leg, an' steals their piece. Then starts it up all over again.
Basically, the three of us—all three of us together—we're unstoppable. Without even knowin' it, Carlos got me covered. Zappin' dudes who's tryna sneak up on me. Ran's got Carlos. I got Ran. The synergy? It's amazing.
Yeah, I hardly notice anything goin' on right now aside from this fight. Like everything in this room fallin' apart. All the stray shots hittin' the electronics, all the bodies bein' tossed on the important equipment, the frequent quakes from whatever's goin' on outside.
Wait a minute.
That's not good.
So maybe fighting these pirates in the main command place of the ship wasn't a good idea. Maybe ignoring everything else going on wasn't a good idea either. Now that I'm taking a step back to actually look at what's happening—yeeeah—it's pretty bad.
The room is overrun with all manner of wild, weird, and strange creatures—the scaly winged fliers, the lizard faces, the stone giants, the wasp people—and they all unloadin' on the place. I don't think they even aimin' for us anymore. They jus' firin' shots at the hardware now. All the electronics—computers, dashboards, chairs, walls—they don't care. Might as well be, an' we ain't helpin' much either. Ran was right. This was a fight we didn't need to have.
As I duck behind this table I knocked over for cover, I notice the sword I'm holdin's practically leakin' blue light. Every shot, every pulse, and every impact that I blocked with it is somehow all stored up right here in this blade It looks pretty hot, too. It's stored up enough energy for what I'm guessin's gonna be a blast large enough to wipe out this room, the hall outside, and this whole section of the ship with it. I don't want that. How do I shoot a little wave over a bigger one? Do I not put as much effort in the swing? Do I just wish really hard? Some of the energy the sword absorbs leaks into me. I feel it like a sugar rush. Is there a way for me to take most of the energy and leave the sword with only a little to fire off?
Staak it. I'mma do it. I'mma try it. I'mma wish really hard, and gently swing. No big arch with it, jus' swing.
I get up. I stand to my feet. I look around, hold up this giant sword and...
Where'd errbody go?
I don't know. I think while I was under there, I heard 'em talkin'. The aliens said somethin'. Oh there's a few over—nope—they're teleporting away. Flash of light, and they fade out. They fade with no trace but their sparkling after image. Then that flickers away not even a second later.
Now it's just us. Me, Ran, and Carlos in this room on this ship that's falling apart. Sparks jump from one piece of equipment to another. The walls have burn marks and bullet holes on them. The lights flicker on and off every few moments. Smoke from some of the computers overheating is clogging up the air. Everything in here is fried.
Ran, now in her human appearance walks over to me shouting about, well...
“I told this would happen!”
“This isn't my fault!” I defend myself.
“You just had to charge at them!”
“They were gonna do the same!”
“Carlos had it under control!”
“Not from where I was standin'!”
“All we had to do was pass on by, and—”
“Callate! Callate! Come on!” Carlos interrupts. “Ship's falling apart, remember? We can blame each other later!”
He and Ran then rush to—well, they're not rushing to the same place—Ran rushes to the bridge, Carlos teleports some place. Ran's pressing all sorts of buttons, getting frustrated at the results that show up on the screen in the table.
The big, flashing, red warning light seems to come back on flashing and warning like the light does, but there's no sound to it. Maybe it broke, maybe Ran jus turned it off. I wouldn't know. I wouldn't know, because I don't know. There's nothing I can do right now except sit, wait, and pray.
So I sit down on the floor. I try to find a comfortable position to sit in. Do I cross my legs? Do I spread 'em out? Do I lie down? Should I find a wall to sit against? I can't really decide, so I shift between all the positions periodically. Then I get frustrated over it, and stand up again.
The room shakes again. Like it got hit with something. I hear Ran ask herself, “What was that?” in a moaning, begrudgingly way. She presses some buttons, and a holographic image appears in front of her. It's a big image of the outside. Camera feeds of what's going on outside of the ship right now. What do they show? Well, each image shows that there's still other space ships surrounding us. Not only surrounding, but shooting? The pirates are still—
“Damn it, the pirates are still here!” Ran exclaims.
Each pirate ship fires a barrage of cannon fire. They want to leave us with nothing. Kinda messed up.
Carlos appears in the room and runs to Ran.
“They're still here?” he asks. Clearly out of breath. Panting heavily.
“They're still here!” Ran responds.
“Mierda! Well, to add on to it, the main engine's busted, our warp drive is kaput, and if they keep shooting us, this boat's gonna go under in a big way.”
“We need to leave.”
“We need to leave.”
The rumblings then stop. No more ship-quakes. That means the pirates stopped firing, right? I look at the big holographic image and see the pirate ships start warp jumping away. One by one, they run.
“We could get to the escape pods?”
“What escape pods?”
“No escape pods. Okay then. That's stupid, but okay. Where did you get—never mind—we need to 'port away. How's the ship's—”
“Like everything else.”
“Come on!” Carlos exclaims. “Damn it! I can only take one of you at a time.”
“Take Darius.”
“I'll be back.”
The next thing I know, Carlos has my arm, and we're in a different room. Completely different. My stomach feels like it was turned upside down. I feel dizzy. I feel light headed. Porting with Carlos is never a pleasant experience, but this time feels worse. Looks like it hit him just as hard, too.
“That was extremely lucky,” he says.
The room we're in looks like a storage closet of some sort. Clothes, suits, armor, guns all on the floor. There's a window here. Just so happens to be facing our ship. Looks even worse than the camera feed let on. I look around and see there's still a few other pirate ships in the area. Shoot, they had a whole fleet. Doesn't take long for them to get gone, though. I think this ship is the only one left now.
We're the only one left.
Dang.
“Come on Carlos!” I say.
“I know!”
“Ran's still back there!”
“I know!”
“They're leaving!”
“I know! Damn it!”
I grab his shoulders and look him in the eye. Don't think he's gonna make it. What do I do? Slap him? That works in movies. Shake him? He's not sleeping, he's just exhausted. He's exhausted. What do I do? What do I do? What can I do? I can't think. Think! Think! Not enough time to think! Shoot.
“Get off me!” he shoves me at the wall. That's good. That's good right? He's got enough in him to push me. He's got enough in him for one last port.
But when I look out the window, it's already too late. Our ship is gone, and we're in hyperspace. Yeah. That space in between timespace. Can't look out the window for long. All the stuff passing us by. I can't really see any of it. I think Ri'lar said one time that things traveling here move way too fast to see anything. Warping like this, jumping lightyears and lightyears away, but the feeling. It's a similar feeling that I get whenever Carlos ports me some place. Not exactly the same. With Carlos, it's like I'm being turned inside out. With warp jumping, it's more like I'm being jerked some place. It's—it's something you get used to, yes, but—not something you'd ever enjoy.
We return to real space. That jolting return, like we just crashed some place else. Maybe if I traveled more it wouldn't bother me, but I don't, so it always does, especially after what just happened. After an event like that.
Carlos isn't taking it too well. Not well at all. He's rambling. Muttering to himself as he paces back and forth in the little space we have in this room. I hear half words, some English, some Spanish. One thing I make out is something like, “I don't even need to know where I'm going, just how far away it is!” I'm assuming he's talkin' about his ST.
“Dude, chill out!” I exclaim. Then realizing where I am, I lower my voice to barely above a whisper. I got a soft voice to begin with, so I slow it down, hoping to come off as clear as I can. “You messed up. It happens. It wasn't your fault.”
“Ran's dead, Darius. Do you get that? She's dead, and it's on me for freezing up.”
Episode 23: Left Behind
Table of Contents
I'm spotted as soon as I bolt in the door. Greeted by all manner of plasma, laser—shoot, I think there's a few shelled shots in the mix, too. The sword's big enough to almost cover all of me, but even the few strays that end up hittin' me, barely leave a scratch. Good ol' super durability. I love my ST. And none of the shots are makin' me black out like before. Good stuff.
While I'm running in, Ran decides to use me as cover to get around and start up whatever sneak attack she's got up her sleeve. Carlos continues his tactic of teleport, shoot, teleport. Shots fired every which way. Miniature explosions bursting out. I don't care though. Right now, the only thing that matters is fighting these fools off.
I push my way to the middle of the crowd, swinging my sword all around me as I do a spinning type motion. The aliens do their best to duck and roll away. Then I start to pull out the big stuff. All that energy that got stored up? This sword is glowin'. Pulsatin' every few half seconds.
With the next swing, I shoot off a blue burst of light. Nothing too drastic, but the blast is enough to knock two of the aliens down at once. They ain't movin' after that. I guarantee you. I turn around, and fire another blast at the aliens there. The three of them fall out, too.
Next thing I know, a laser barely misses my cheek bone. I turn to the door an' see that their calvery's arrived. Must be dang near every single pirate who boarded the ship fallin' in this room now. Word musta got out they was gettin' they tails beat.
These pirates is free. I'm jus' runnin' on autopilot now. Block their attacks with the sword. Charge in at 'em. Strike 'em down. One by one, two by two, three by three. They all fall. I'm so caught up in my swingin', I barely notice Ran transforming into this huge two headed dragon lookin' thing. Bitin' off people's heads, crushin' folks with her tail. Gettin' pretty gruesome on her end. And Carlos? That dude is like on another level with his marksmanship. You wouldn't know if he ran outta ammo or not, cuz as soon as he unloads a clip, he teleports right next to the dude he was shootin', breaks an arm, breaks a leg, an' steals their piece. Then starts it up all over again.
Basically, the three of us—all three of us together—we're unstoppable. Without even knowin' it, Carlos got me covered. Zappin' dudes who's tryna sneak up on me. Ran's got Carlos. I got Ran. The synergy? It's amazing.
Yeah, I hardly notice anything goin' on right now aside from this fight. Like everything in this room fallin' apart. All the stray shots hittin' the electronics, all the bodies bein' tossed on the important equipment, the frequent quakes from whatever's goin' on outside.
Wait a minute.
That's not good.
So maybe fighting these pirates in the main command place of the ship wasn't a good idea. Maybe ignoring everything else going on wasn't a good idea either. Now that I'm taking a step back to actually look at what's happening—yeeeah—it's pretty bad.
The room is overrun with all manner of wild, weird, and strange creatures—the scaly winged fliers, the lizard faces, the stone giants, the wasp people—and they all unloadin' on the place. I don't think they even aimin' for us anymore. They jus' firin' shots at the hardware now. All the electronics—computers, dashboards, chairs, walls—they don't care. Might as well be, an' we ain't helpin' much either. Ran was right. This was a fight we didn't need to have.
As I duck behind this table I knocked over for cover, I notice the sword I'm holdin's practically leakin' blue light. Every shot, every pulse, and every impact that I blocked with it is somehow all stored up right here in this blade It looks pretty hot, too. It's stored up enough energy for what I'm guessin's gonna be a blast large enough to wipe out this room, the hall outside, and this whole section of the ship with it. I don't want that. How do I shoot a little wave over a bigger one? Do I not put as much effort in the swing? Do I just wish really hard? Some of the energy the sword absorbs leaks into me. I feel it like a sugar rush. Is there a way for me to take most of the energy and leave the sword with only a little to fire off?
Staak it. I'mma do it. I'mma try it. I'mma wish really hard, and gently swing. No big arch with it, jus' swing.
I get up. I stand to my feet. I look around, hold up this giant sword and...
Where'd errbody go?
I don't know. I think while I was under there, I heard 'em talkin'. The aliens said somethin'. Oh there's a few over—nope—they're teleporting away. Flash of light, and they fade out. They fade with no trace but their sparkling after image. Then that flickers away not even a second later.
Now it's just us. Me, Ran, and Carlos in this room on this ship that's falling apart. Sparks jump from one piece of equipment to another. The walls have burn marks and bullet holes on them. The lights flicker on and off every few moments. Smoke from some of the computers overheating is clogging up the air. Everything in here is fried.
Ran, now in her human appearance walks over to me shouting about, well...
“I told this would happen!”
“This isn't my fault!” I defend myself.
“You just had to charge at them!”
“They were gonna do the same!”
“Carlos had it under control!”
“Not from where I was standin'!”
“All we had to do was pass on by, and—”
“Callate! Callate! Come on!” Carlos interrupts. “Ship's falling apart, remember? We can blame each other later!”
He and Ran then rush to—well, they're not rushing to the same place—Ran rushes to the bridge, Carlos teleports some place. Ran's pressing all sorts of buttons, getting frustrated at the results that show up on the screen in the table.
The big, flashing, red warning light seems to come back on flashing and warning like the light does, but there's no sound to it. Maybe it broke, maybe Ran jus turned it off. I wouldn't know. I wouldn't know, because I don't know. There's nothing I can do right now except sit, wait, and pray.
So I sit down on the floor. I try to find a comfortable position to sit in. Do I cross my legs? Do I spread 'em out? Do I lie down? Should I find a wall to sit against? I can't really decide, so I shift between all the positions periodically. Then I get frustrated over it, and stand up again.
The room shakes again. Like it got hit with something. I hear Ran ask herself, “What was that?” in a moaning, begrudgingly way. She presses some buttons, and a holographic image appears in front of her. It's a big image of the outside. Camera feeds of what's going on outside of the ship right now. What do they show? Well, each image shows that there's still other space ships surrounding us. Not only surrounding, but shooting? The pirates are still—
“Damn it, the pirates are still here!” Ran exclaims.
Each pirate ship fires a barrage of cannon fire. They want to leave us with nothing. Kinda messed up.
Carlos appears in the room and runs to Ran.
“They're still here?” he asks. Clearly out of breath. Panting heavily.
“They're still here!” Ran responds.
“Mierda! Well, to add on to it, the main engine's busted, our warp drive is kaput, and if they keep shooting us, this boat's gonna go under in a big way.”
“We need to leave.”
“We need to leave.”
The rumblings then stop. No more ship-quakes. That means the pirates stopped firing, right? I look at the big holographic image and see the pirate ships start warp jumping away. One by one, they run.
“We could get to the escape pods?”
“What escape pods?”
“No escape pods. Okay then. That's stupid, but okay. Where did you get—never mind—we need to 'port away. How's the ship's—”
“Like everything else.”
“Come on!” Carlos exclaims. “Damn it! I can only take one of you at a time.”
“Take Darius.”
“I'll be back.”
The next thing I know, Carlos has my arm, and we're in a different room. Completely different. My stomach feels like it was turned upside down. I feel dizzy. I feel light headed. Porting with Carlos is never a pleasant experience, but this time feels worse. Looks like it hit him just as hard, too.
“That was extremely lucky,” he says.
The room we're in looks like a storage closet of some sort. Clothes, suits, armor, guns all on the floor. There's a window here. Just so happens to be facing our ship. Looks even worse than the camera feed let on. I look around and see there's still a few other pirate ships in the area. Shoot, they had a whole fleet. Doesn't take long for them to get gone, though. I think this ship is the only one left now.
We're the only one left.
Dang.
“Come on Carlos!” I say.
“I know!”
“Ran's still back there!”
“I know!”
“They're leaving!”
“I know! Damn it!”
I grab his shoulders and look him in the eye. Don't think he's gonna make it. What do I do? Slap him? That works in movies. Shake him? He's not sleeping, he's just exhausted. He's exhausted. What do I do? What do I do? What can I do? I can't think. Think! Think! Not enough time to think! Shoot.
“Get off me!” he shoves me at the wall. That's good. That's good right? He's got enough in him to push me. He's got enough in him for one last port.
But when I look out the window, it's already too late. Our ship is gone, and we're in hyperspace. Yeah. That space in between timespace. Can't look out the window for long. All the stuff passing us by. I can't really see any of it. I think Ri'lar said one time that things traveling here move way too fast to see anything. Warping like this, jumping lightyears and lightyears away, but the feeling. It's a similar feeling that I get whenever Carlos ports me some place. Not exactly the same. With Carlos, it's like I'm being turned inside out. With warp jumping, it's more like I'm being jerked some place. It's—it's something you get used to, yes, but—not something you'd ever enjoy.
We return to real space. That jolting return, like we just crashed some place else. Maybe if I traveled more it wouldn't bother me, but I don't, so it always does, especially after what just happened. After an event like that.
Carlos isn't taking it too well. Not well at all. He's rambling. Muttering to himself as he paces back and forth in the little space we have in this room. I hear half words, some English, some Spanish. One thing I make out is something like, “I don't even need to know where I'm going, just how far away it is!” I'm assuming he's talkin' about his ST.
“Dude, chill out!” I exclaim. Then realizing where I am, I lower my voice to barely above a whisper. I got a soft voice to begin with, so I slow it down, hoping to come off as clear as I can. “You messed up. It happens. It wasn't your fault.”
“Ran's dead, Darius. Do you get that? She's dead, and it's on me for freezing up.”
