Ad Astra Per Aspera 9

“IT’S A TRAP!” Logi yells as we jump up and start to make a hasty retreat.

POP, POP, POP

“CONTACT RIGHT!” Boro yells. The sound of her scout rifle fills the air as she starts firing.

You three are toast. Lemme give ya a freebie or two.

The guttural voice of Satan says. Almost as a whisper in my ear. However, it did seem like he was helping as a giant wall of flame erupts around us.

“Y-y-your arm.” Logi stutters pointing at it. Thinking it was something about it being missing I look and even my eyes widen in horror at the obsidian black scaled arm that appeared.

I told you it’s a freebie.

“RETREAT! FALLBACK TO THE SUNRISE! I’LL MISLEAD THEM!” I yell unslinging my own rifle and starting to let loose as well. I couldn’t have whatever it was destroying the whole ship and crew. “Stay in the walls and nothing should reach you! No matter what, tell the Commander what happened here!”

It made sense in my mind. If I died, I would comeback in a day or two. If they died, they were gone forever. Don’t get me wrong, dying hurt a lot, but if I could spare another life through that pain then I was okay with that.

After giving that command, I break through the wall and the first thing that greets me is a roughly two-meter tall, armored Praying Mantis type creature. However instead of raptorial legs it had two blade like arms instead. I instinctively step backwards narrowly avoiding a swing. I fire a quick burst of six rounds, and it falls over. I turn my attention to the other creatures who were focused on Logi and Boro and drop them as well. As the bodies piled up a horrid stench entered through my filters and a red warning filled my vision and my vision started to blur.

WARNING. OXYGEN COMPRIMISED. VENT IMMEDIATELY.

Not long after Ozark engaged the enemy, the two scouts ran as fast as they could with the cover of the flame wall. The constant screeches and hissing of burning bugs surrounded them. It was while they were scaling a hill when they noticed the hisses had died and the wall was beginning to flicker away. Noticing there was no immediate danger they turned to see how the situation was going. They saw what looked like Ozark desperately trying to vent his mask as two insects rush him. One of them circles around and with a lighting quick swipe its armlike leg pierces him from behind.

Both girls wanted to go help but instinct told them doing so would only result in their death. That when with what seemed like superhuman strength Ozark breaks the creatures and it rears it head back screeching in pain but almost immediately after he point his rifle behind him, and four or five bursts go off and the creature drops and the second one stops and tries to circle around a different way.

Finally, it goes for a straight assault and as it swings, he catches the leg mid air and in the most unexpected move they ever seen in combat he pulls the bug to him and begins to bash his head against its, until he flings it on the ground. Just when it seemed like he caught a break, a green liquid spats on his back knocking him onto the ground and a dark smoke begins to emit from him. That’s when they noticed a black six-legged bug with red stripes on its leg, hidden between the chain guns on the ship.

“Fuck it. I can’t leave him to die all alone.” Boro says starting to slide down the hill, but Logi stops her.

“He’ll be fine. He’ll just come back to life anyway.” She says trying to pull her back but Boro jerks loose.

“Yeah. He’ll comeback IF he has a body. If those things eat him what then huh?”

“That’s…”

“We’ve lasted a lot longer than we should have thanks to him and yet the majority of the crew still treats him like dirt for being a Hull Tech and not a Combat Class. Even if I die, I want him to know he had at least one person who truly believed in and respected him to end.” Boro says fully determined to fight with him to the end.

They look over and see him back up deeply engaged with multiple grasshoppers. Either he ran out of ammo or caught jam because the next thing they saw was him throw down the rifle and unsheathe his knife.

“I DO TO! YOU THINK I DON’T?” Logi snaps scaring Boro. “But you saw what happened. He’s doing what at minimum should be squad task. How can we keep up with that?”

“With faith that he’ll cover our blind spots.” Boro says confidently. “He easily could have made an eascape without us. But he stayed and bought us time that we’re now wasting. However, he can’t win alone.”

A small smile cracks Logi’s lips as the words that were needed to confirm her wish was spoken. “Good. Cause I have absolute faith in myself.”

“Armor integrity at 9% and dropping. Health at 33% and rapidly declining. Retreating and healing highly recommend.” S.A.R.A.H reports as I remove my blade from the body of the grasshopper I just impaled. As soon as it hit the ground the next one tried a surprise attack from the side, but I sidestepped it and slice it completely down its side. Another green residue flies past me and I duck. I didn’t know how many more times I could get hit but with my armor this low I highly doubted it would be more than one.

“S.A.R.A.H, can you hack into the ships systems and powerup the guns?”

“Yes. However due to the ship being off I would need you to get me on board and then buy me time to power it, start the coolant supply, and begin warmup. Can you buy me roughly 10 minutes? Damage to the weapons will be substantial but I can have them online and engaged in that time.”

“I doubt I can buy you 10 seconds at this point but yeah. I’ll do it.” I tell her ducking another lob and then rushing the ship.

SPLAT, PISSSSSSS

CLUMP

“AAAHHH!” I knocked onto my back, and I scream as I’m hit by the lobbed acid of another creature that was hidden. I frantically try and wipe it off but only end up spreading it and inflicting more pain on myself.

“Armor integrity less than 1%. Any more damage will be received at 100%.” S.A.R.A.H reports as I try and get up all my wounds had started to become known, and the pain made it nearly impossible to move. That’s when I saw the second acid spitting bug appear from the side of the ship. There was nothing I could do. This was finally it. I could finally die for good.

Or so I thought because as soon as I saw the green sack start to puff up it burst, and a video message from S.A.R.A.H appeared in my shattered mask screen. “Due to an absolute faith, comparable to the belief in God you and your party are protected from all danger for 90 seconds.” She states and I can only look at her in confusion. That’s when I hear the HMPH of someone grabbing me followed by the feeling of getting dragged. That’s when the sounds of bursting gun fired reached my ears and I look over my shoulder and see Logi dragging me.

“What are y’all doing?” I ask baffled that they came back.

“We couldn’t let you die on your own. Even if you can resurrect how can you return if your body is melted or you eaten?” She says slapping the scanner of the rear bay and pulling me on board. Shortly after we get up the ramp Boro runs in and closes it. Multiple acids and what I assumed to be stingers were shot at us but the new protection nullified all damage.

“Take me to the bridge and insert me.” SARAH says as the two girls help me up.

“We gotta go to the bridge.” I tell them and they nod and help me there. There were a couple of creatures inside but due to the tight quarters they couldn’t move as they pleased and were killed almost instantly. Once we got into the bridge I reach behind my head for and pull S.A.R.A.H’s chip from the base of my neck and insert it into the ships port. Teal blue lights run through the ship like blood veins as she starts to take over.

“Ozark, we have a problem. Inbound aircraft. Hostile. Based off its armaments it’ll tear this ship apart.” SARAH says over the speakers.

AHAHAHAHA

“Very well.” I mutter heartbrokenly as the guttural voice laughs at out predicament. There was only one way to get these two girls home alive. “Stay here and don’t come out no matter what.”

“Understood.” Both girls confirm and watch me as I walk to the back of the ship and lower the bay door.

The door hisses open and I walk down the ramp. I don’t know if it was because of the inbound ship or what but as I walked down the ramp, I could tell the creatures were starting to back off. Well not that it mattered now.

I take a deep breath and look up at the giant wasp like ship. It was dark blue, with bright orange wings, and long legs. And at the end was curved like stinger. Then I saw it start to swivel towards me.

“Satan, ruler of all below. In your name I take these lives. Grant me your strength and turn their lifeless corpses into material to help me. Their souls can go to you.”

DEAL.

The two girls who snuck after him both cover their mouths as obsidian like scales cover his body and he shoots into the air. They quickly return inside and watch from the camera feeds that S.A.R.A.H had pulled up. Apparently in the time it took to get back 9 more ships arrived. Not that it made a difference. One by one Ozark savagely tore through the ships. It was like he was possessed, but that wasn’t what scared them. It was the fact they believed so wholeheartedly in him that they didn’t care. That was just how far he was willing to go to protect them and they were alright with that.

“Oh my. This is quite the problem.” S.A.R.A.H says lightly to herself as she runs through the processes of starting the guns. “Oh, this is highly problematic.”

“What’s wrong?” Logi asks as walking up to her.

“Well, you see. Yesterday we received multiple ships with an emergency broadcast. 25 to exact. However, after re-running some scans after what happened earlier. The results finally came back. Excluding this one and the one Ozark set after day one of his arrival, my reports show that the remaining 23 are all broadcasting the same signal as this one was.” She answers before populating in front of the girls.

“Which means?” Boro asked this time meeting the eyes of the little blue woman.

“That unless they are on foot, there are no other survivors from the U.N.S.F DARE. As it currently stands, we are the sole survivors of this world.” She explains and then as if to prove what she meant she played the Emergency Broadcast they picked up from the PREDICTION and then ran it alongside the other 23 Emergency broadcasts and both girls’ eyes widen as it finally clicked on how she came to that conclusion.

All of the signals were exactly the same and when you decrypted them, they all read TRAP.