Chapter 25. Fade to Black

We entered the facility to see hallways to the left and right, curving in the distance around what I assumed was the stasis chamber that Tiff was being held in. Elvis had given us detailed schematics of the facility, so we knew exactly where we were. What we didn’t know was where the other security detail was. I could see mobs if they were within about 100 yards of me, but I didn’t see anything right now.

“We need to move fast. Is your suit all good?” I asked CJ as we stood in the hall.

“Yeah, all good,” he said. “I noticed you leveled up,” he responded through the internal comms channel.

He was right. I had gotten credit for the kills in the cargo bay, and I was now Level 8. I wondered if it was going to continue to be this easy to gain levels. I also guessed I was getting more credit for killing enemies that were at a higher level than me.

“We can worry about that when we get out of this place. Right now, we need to focus on finding Tiff and trying to stay away from that other security detail if we can,” I said.

Elvis took the liberty of uploading the schematics into my interface allowing us to have a good idea of where I was going. I didn’t realize how big this place was though. The circumference was at least a kilometer, so we were gonna have some walking to do.

The facility was a cold sterile place. The inside hallways were dark, with bundles of metal conduit running along the ceiling. The walls and floor were a dark charcoal grey, and there were well-worn lines down the middle from what I assumed were the never-ending pre-programmed security details. The air smelled stale and old. Once we entered through the exterior door, the life support systems had been activated, and it was obvious that it had been a long time since anything that breathed had been here. Needless to say, this place wasn’t inviting and obviously not meant for any biological life form to live long-term.

“Okay, let’s take the right-side hallway. The entrance to the stasis chamber should be about halfway around,” I said to CJ as we started jogging toward the door.

“Hey Andy, how are we going to get back out of here?” CJ asked as we jogged.

“I don’t know yet; I could really use Tiff and Elvis right now. Shouldn’t there be a maintenance bot or something?” I asked.

“You’re right!” CJ shouted. “I remember Elvis pointing out the maintenance stations when we were planning. There should be one a couple hundred yards past the Stasis chamber entrance,” he said.

“Okay, I'll get Tiff and you go on ahead to the maintenance station and see if you can figure out how to get them into the cargo bay. There should be some sort of panel or something to input off-schedule maintenance requests. That’s the best hope we have right now. If it doesn’t work, we're going to have to try our luck with grenades,” I said.

“Fuck that, bro. We are not throwing a bunch of grenades at a sealed safety door in hopes that it will blow. Do you just think about every action movie ever created and try to formulate a plan based on what the action hero would do?!” CJ was looking at me as we jogged.

“I'm just throwing ideas out, CJ. We aren’t exactly prepared for this scenario,” I said.

After a few more minutes we arrived at the stasis chamber door. I had CJ run ahead and start working on getting that bay door open. I told him I would meet him back at the Pup after I got Tiff’s body. He ran off down the hallway and I entered the stasis chamber.

The chamber was jarring in its juxtaposition to the outer hallway. Bright white light filled the room, which was huge spanning from one side of the station to the other, with only the outer hallway running along the outside of the room. The inside was completely empty. The entire roof was emitting a soft white light. There were no light fixtures, the whole ceiling seemed to be a light. The floor was spotless white like nobody had ever walked here; it almost looked like laminate, but there were no individual tiles. In the middle of the room stood a cylindrical tank. Tubes were snaking into the tank from the floor and ceiling. In the tank Tiff floated, she wore a white body suit and she looked lifeless.

I ran toward the tank. I didn’t know what to expect when I saw Tiff’s true body. I knew that she would be here, but how could anyone prepare themselves for this? I had just been talking with her a few hours ago, yet here she was. Her body floated in the tank, her eyes closed, no signs of life. Yet I knew she was alive.

I didn’t know how to empty the tank. It had 4 glass panels, one on each side of the tank. Aside from the viewing panels, the tank was some sort of white metal from floor to ceiling.

“Fuck it,” I said. I equipped my armor and with every ounce of my enhanced strength I could muster I punched one of the glass panels. It cracked, spiderwebs forming throughout the glass. Tiff’s body jerked. I reared back again and punched the glass. Liquid poured out of the tank, and with it, Tiff’s true body.

I caught her body as it slid out of the tank. I deactivated my armor and knelt down, her body cradled in my arms, “Tiff, Tiff, wake up,” she didn’t move.

“C’mon Tiff, we gotta get out of here. You need to wake up.” I shook her gently trying to help her wake up.

Suddenly she heaved and her eyes shot open shining impossibly blue, a sign of her alien origins. “Andrew?” she asked as she coughed the liquid out of her lungs.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Yeah, I got you,” I said.

“Take a second to get your bearings, but we’ve got to move soon. A lot has happened since we entered the dampening field.”

“Well, I’m glad I’m out of that tank Andrew, but you are going to have to get me back to the Pup. Once I leave this room the dampening field will begin to affect me again. CJ can carry me with the Havok Hound suit. Where is he?” Tiff asked as she started to sit up.

“Well, we kind of destroyed the force field on the docking bay door. CJ is trying to assign a maintenance bot to see if he can get it repaired. We were supposed to meet him back in the Pup after I got you,” I said.

Tiff just shook her head in disgust. “I don’t even want to know right now, Andrew. We can debrief once were back on the Blood Hound. You will need to call CJ and let him know to come get me and bring me to the Pup.”

“CJ, how’s it going?” I said through the comms channel.

“It’s good. The maintenance bot is at the generator now. I asked it for an ETA, and it said about 10 minutes,” he said.

“Okay, I need you to hustle back and get Tiff. She won't be conscious once she leaves this room. It’s time to test the speed on that suit, red line, and get back here quick,” I said.

“Got it. I was waiting for an excuse to red line this bitch!” CJ said. “I’ll be there in 3 minutes.”

“Okay we will be wai-“

BOOOM!!!

A grenade exploded and sent Tiff and me flying. As I was flying through the air I equipped my armor. The armor fully equipped just in time to cushion my fall, but Tiff wasn’t as lucky. She was thrown back into the stasis tank and now she lay there on the floor in front of it unconscious. The previously spotless white floor was now stained with a puddle of blue blood that was flowing from a wound in the back of her head.

“What the hell was that?!” CJ’s voice was fading in and out of my head.

I pushed myself up from the ground, shaking my head trying to get my bearings. My health bar was under 20%. I mentally selected a health stim to top it back off, and as I did, I heard the hiss of the stim draining into my neck.

“I’m not sure. Something exploded, Tiff is injured. I need you to get here fast!” I shouted.

“One minute, I’m close,” CJ said.

As he was speaking, I saw them coming through the smoke. The second security detail was here. This time they didn’t give warnings they just opened fire.

I jumped to my left side, trying to draw the fire away from Tiff so she wouldn’t be hit with a stray bullet. I ran as fast as my armor would carry me trying to get behind them.

“CJ, it’s the second security detail. GET HERE!” I shouted.

At that moment CJ’s suit exploded into the room running full speed. I could see him in the distance. The suit had to be running 35-40 miles an hour. He was about half a mile away, but he was covering the distance at a blinding pace.

I kept running trying to be sure I could get behind CJ. His suit would have to act as my cover since there was no other cover available in this room.

“I have three minutes left on my armor CJ; we need to finish this fast!” I shouted.

As CJ finally made it to my location, I fell in behind him. He raised his weapon at the Mech guard on the left of the Giant Mech. “I’ll focus fire on the one on the left, you take the one on the right,” he said.

“Got it. We can both attack the Mech once the guards are down!” I responded.

We were running faster than any human could possibly run, but our aim was still perfect. CJ landed several shots on the left guard, but it wasn’t going down easy, and it continued to fire. The kinetic rounds from the Mech guards were hitting CJ’s suit but it continued to absorb the damage.

As I was running, I morphed my sidearm into the long-range rifle version, aimed, and took off the head of the guard on the right with one shot.

“One down. We gotta keep them away from Tiff!” I said as CJ and I continued running.

Just then the Mech fired a concentrated laser beam taking off the right arm of CJ’s suit and grazing my left upper arm. My suit self-repaired and I took very little damage from the blast.

“Shit, my suit is down to 30% power. We have got to take that Mech out, Andy. Stay on the guard on the Mech’s right and I’ll go straight for the Mech,” CJ said.

With that, he reached down and pulled out a foot-long combat knife from a sheath on his left leg. The blade glowed brightly as he ran. We were about 25 feet away from the Mech when CJ jumped and landed right on the Mech’s body. He started hacking at anything that looked important as the Mech spun and tried to rid itself of the unwanted passenger.

As CJ jumped, I slid toward the Mech guard. It fired its weapon as I slid toward it but to no avail. I slid past the guard and as I did, I grabbed its right ankle and spun myself up behind it. I grabbed the guard in a bear hug under its arms then heaved the heavy robot up and suplexed it onto its head.

“Scratch one more guard,” I said as I jumped back up into action to help CJ who was still riding the Mech. The Mech was on its last legs, smoke rising from its back and several wires and hoses hanging loosely all over its body. I pulled up my sidearm, took aim, and fired 5 rounds of the powered energy blasts directly into the front of its upper section.

With this, the Mech stopped and slowly settled to the ground. No explosion, no crazy ending, it just powered down.

“Holy shit! We're alive!” CJ shouted as he dismounted the disabled Mech.

“To be fair, you were never in danger of dying, bro,” I shot back as we both ran over to Tiff.

“She isn’t moving. We have got to get her back to the Blood Hound and let Elvis fix her up.” I looked over at CJ, “Can you carry her with the missing arm?” I asked.

“Yeah, no problem. You will just need to pick her up for me then I can hold her while we run back to the Pup,” he said.

“Okay, my armor is spent. It will be a few minutes before I can reactivate it. You run ahead with Tiff, and I’ll be right behind you,” I said as I gently picked up Tiff and placed her over the Havok Hound's shoulder.

CJ took off immediately running at a fast pace, but not as fast as he had been when trying to get back to the stasis chamber. I was about 2 minutes behind them, but I didn’t want to reactivate my armor just in case I needed it.

As I entered the cargo bay, I could see that the force field had been repaired and the safety door had been raised. CJ had already spun the Pup around preparing for a quick evac. As I ran toward the ship, I could see that he had Tiff’s body secured and he was waving for me to hurry up.

Initiate the auto-pilot sequence, get the ship moving!" I yelled to CJ as I continued running toward the Pup.

CJ spun around and tapped the display to initiate the autopilot for the Pup, as he did the ship's propulsion systems activated and the Pup levitated gently of the ground. I was almost there.

That’s when I felt the blade push through my back and out the front of my abdomen. I stopped running, looked down and felt the wound with both hands. The blade was sharp, jagged and covered in hot red blood, my blood.

“GO! GET TIFF BACK TO THE SHIP!” I screamed as my legs faltered and I fell to my knees.

CJ was screaming something incoherent as the Pup shot out of the cargo bay door. I saw the rear door of the Pup slide shut as he pressed against it before disappearing completely.

“I told you I would be watching, Human,” a voice hissed in my ear from behind.

Everything went black.