The Crasher’s hanger

Akamori snapped his helmet's faceplate on, the small pieces all telescoping and falling into place. He could see the seams merging with small lines of aether, and then it was one solid plate. His heads up display winked into place. Small wedge-shaped markers pointed down at the Lieutenant, Amara, and Sala. His status marker was green. Peeking down at the heads up display in the bottom center of the hud he could see the damage status display which showed a small paper doll of the armor and it was all white. It also had five vials of potions stocked with the supplies the Captain got during the trip to the Forge.

He moved his reticle over them for more information and saw that two of them were counter spells (Which was good because he had no idea how to do that without a potion), two healing potions, and a clear potion that had sparkling motes of light called The Tears of Eryn. He squinted and focused the reticle on it. The description simply read: “A potion capable of warding off the sorrow of Eryn.” Any more than that, though, and he was completely clueless. He was about to ask if anyone knew about it when the eltee spoke up before him.

“I trust you trash know the mission? We’re to infiltrate the station, secure a beachhead, and allow the movement of our marines to further take it completely. The first phase will be our movement to the station. Amara, do you have your potions of invisibility loaded, as I requested?”

Amara nodded. “Yes, sir.” She turned and showed him the pink fluid filled vials nested in the bandoleer on her armor.

Rayshe nodded sharply, and gave the team a quick look, though Akamori noticed the look the Lt. gave passed over Sala quickly. In the distance, over the eltee’s shoulder, Akamori could see the station. It was a large cylinder with a ring of smaller modules ringing it. He couldn’t see any external defenses, but at the extreme range the Crasher was, the naked eye wouldn’t have been able to pull any details out anyhow.

“The plan is simple. Private Amara will engage her first potion of invisibility once we assume formation, and we will spacewalk to the station. Once there, we will infiltrate the station and secure a beachhead for a full stage invasion to follow.”

Everyone gave the eltee a north and south of the head. They were ready. Akamori’s hand drifted to his blade, clipped to his belt. The consciousness there pulsed a greeting to him and he patted the hilt. He noted the sword felt different from before Xanofex. It felt bigger, or fuller? The pulse almost felt like a greeting, or an eagerness. The rifle slung on his back was slightly more primitive, but to his understanding it had touched less magic, so it wasn’t as aware.

Rayshe turned and faced the blue barrier. He turned to monitor the chrono on the wall. When it struck zero, he gestured with his hand forward, and the team stepped through the field one at a time. They all formed up and Akamori twisted to summon some air magic to shove them off. No heat, and since there was no resistance in space, there’d be no residual magic to trace. Just letting inertia do its thing.

The invisibility potion vial emptied as the rubber plunger pressed down, and a bubble of pink energy rippled out of Amara’s armor. She disappeared at its center as it continued to expand and overtook the rest of the squad. The team understood that now that it encased them in the bubble; they were to go comm silent to prevent being detected. Akamori was just thankful that inside the sphere of the potion's influence, they could at least see each other. In the distance, several of the dragons perched on the station perked up, then took off in a flurry of flapping leathery wings and talons. The dragons all sped past them in a muted rush, and Akamori quietly let out the tense breath he’d held. Relieved, their ruse had worked so far. Some dragons had passed so closely that he felt like he could reach out and touch their scaled hides as they passed by him.

By the time they reached the station’s airlock, Amara’s invisibility potion had worn off, and the translucent bubble around them dissolved away. Its pink edges burning away into aetheric crumbs. Rayshe drew his pistol from a thigh holster. Once the weapon's grip was in his hands, tracks of aether pulsed along the weapon like magic arteries. It reminded him of the way the Forge looked inside, but in miniature. It wasn’t superb craftsmanship, but it was above average, and very functional.

Rayshe gripped the airlock and nodded to the squad. “Private Akamori, you and Sala will take point. Amara, you’re in the rear with me.”

Akamori used some air to boost forward gently into the lead. Sala slid up alongside, though he could tell the Primal was still keeping some distance between them. Sala refused to look him in the eye and simply scowled ahead. Akamori sighed quietly. I guess he still won’t let that go then. There was nothing for it, though. For now they needed to get in and take a foothold in the station so the Crasher could deploy the Brotherhood marines.

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Rayshe gripped the airlock lever and yanked down. The outer doors opened soundlessly, and the team filed into it. A moment later, they closed the exterior. As the outer airlock doors sealed shut again, clamping off the view from outside. Akamori noted to himself that Phase 1 was now complete. They would move into Phase 2 now. The interior of the station reminded Akamori of a haunted house from the old Brotherhood holos. The light was poor, with busted lighting flickering in spastic death throes. Nothing moved in the heavy silence that hung over the station’s interior. All it lacked was sufficient jump scare material. For the time being. Unconsciously, his hand slid to his sword’s hilt, and it pulsed to him eagerly.

Akamori pulled his spell rifle tighter into his shoulder as he bit back against the anxiety that threatened to overtake him. Stay cool. Stay calm. He told himself. He could do this. When he envisioned tackling the war against the Sauridius mentally, he didn’t expect it to go quite like this.

“Why can they never pick well-lit areas?” he whispered.

Rayshe hissed in his ear through their comms. “Silence!”

There were no bodies. He just realized as they were walking into the station, he hadn’t seen any bodies. “It’s like no one’s home. You don’t think they abandoned the station, do you?” Akamori said over the team net.

Sala shook his head. “No. The station reeks of death. That death is still here.”

Sala tried to open a door, but it refused to yield. He turned to Rayshe for guidance. “Go around. We don’t want to alert the entire station we’re here if we go ripping doors off hinges.”

Everyone nodded and pressed on deeper. Exiting the narrow corridor that fed from the airlock into a wider reception area that spilled out into adjacent corridors that led to other airlocks, Akamori assumed they were in some kind of travel hub portion of the station.

“Eyes up everyone. If they were going to ambush us, this would be the spot,” Amara said.

Sala rolled his shoulders in preparation. They got to the center of the hub area. Emergency evacuation notices flickered and flashed across every monitor and projected surface space. The area was a hexagonal lobby with an airlock corridor extending at each point. All were dark save one. Akamori gestured towards the only lit chamber slowly. As the team turned, his eyes took in the sight better. Light spilled into the empty hub over the heads and shoulders of dozens of people. They all stood motionless. Still as death.

Then, as one, dozens of cloudy white eyes all lifted from the floor to focus on Akamori. Feck me… Faces twisted and snarled as the undead horde shambled into motion like a rope holding them back at been cut. Akamori let loose several level one void bolts that punched tiny black holes into the foreheads of several of the undead. The reaction was so autonomous he marveled at his own reaction speed. He didn’t have long to be pleased with himself, however, as Rayshe’s voice cut in over the team net.

“Stop firing you trash. They’re trying to bleed your aetherpool dry. If you deplete your spells before you encounter the genuine threats, how can you expect to defeat them?”

Akamori grimaced as he noticed his AP gauge in his hud had dropped by 2. “Sorry. force of habit. So we shouldn’t use spells? What should we do?”

“Get creative,” Sala said as grabbed the nearest undead by the scruff of the neck and smashed its face down into the deck so hard, brown fluid splattered everywhere.

“Point taken,” Akamori mused.

A dead Brotherhood marine shambled after him and Akamori fed his armor a quick boost of air, using his knee to rise forward and up. The undead’s clicking jaw smashed into its mouth, teeth shattering, and the jawbone pulverized against the alloy of his spell armor. He then punched down using some void magic to increase the mass of his fist and pulped the marine’s skull into rotten gore that splashed the deck.

He turned, spinning the rifle and using the butt stock to strike down into an advancing zombie’s knee. As the creature staggered clumsily, Akamori spun and clubbed the creature with his rifle butt in the back of its skull. Its head crunched with the sound of dry wood. Snatching the weapon that was dangling from its shoulders, he tugged the buttstock firmly into his shoulder, and sighted down the irons.

The weapon kicked a little sharper than his spell rifle did. Little brass metal casings ejected from the side with each shot as a round slammed through the closest undead’s forehead. The top of its skull falling in like a deflated balloon. Two others dropped after awkward shambling steps like their bodies stopped getting input and the delay was burning dry. Three slumped over and caused the trailing undead to stagger and trip over them. Sala advanced and smashed their heads in while they were down.

The two exchanged looks and repeated the process. Akamori knocking down the front most zombies and allowing Sala to thunder through and smash the stragglers as they clumsily fought to rise back up. Eventually, they picked off the last of the undead, leaving them panting heavily. They traded AP for stamina in this case, but it meant they saved spells, at least. Dropping the depleted weapon, he drew his spell rifle back from its void portal.

He was glad he did too because a short instant later; they heard a loud thudding. A large dark shadow spilled out from behind the back light of the exiting corridor. It was taller than they were by at least a head and a half. Coated in reptilian scales with a mouth full of small spiked teeth. Large wings spread out, and it hefted up a spell cannon as it leered at them. He’d seen this sight before and his blood ran simultaneously cold with dread and hot with rage.

Akamori retreated a few paces closer to the team. “Things just got so much worse.”