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Plasma and Fire
3: Night Run

3: Night Run

He woke in the night to the sound of chittering and flesh tearing, and it took everything he had not to bolt upright and find the source. Instead he carefully opened his eyes and listened, the sound was coming from outside the building he was in, that was good. Gave him a chance to get up and see what it was he supposed. He quietly climbed to his feet and moved towards the nearest hole in the wall, peering through it as he reached down to the leg compartment storing his sidearm.

There was a humanoid figure covered in chitin standing in the middle of road, tearing into and devouring one of the random corpses strewn about with it's bare hands, tipped with claws as it's face seemed to split open with every chunk of flesh it brought to it's mouth. It looked almost exactly like one of the bodies he'd found the other day, aside from the fact that it's chitin was a pale yellow and it was stark naked. Whatever it was the mere sight of it made him feel enraged beyond belief. The compartment popped open with a hiss as the Bugman whipped it's head in his direction, though he'd already pulled the pistol out and stepped into it's view, squeezing the trigger thrice in it's direction.

That was complete overkill, the first bolt of plasma had caught it in it's right shoulder and burst, taking out most of it's upper body in the blast as vibrant green and red fluid splattered and bled from what was left. The other two bolts went wide and slammed into the side of a building, obliterating the wall they'd struck as he stared at the body and the damage the gun had done to it.

It fell over and as it did he realized just how much and how far he could hear, now that the city was no longer silent. Chattering and chittering everywhere and the roar of it's angry kin. He bounded out of the building and locked onto the light he'd been following the previous night, moving fast and hard to get out of the area as he could hear dozens of the creatures swarming towards his location. He knew somehow that the closest were too far to reach him immediately, and about five to eight minutes away but that was pushed aside by the fear, unease, and anger he felt just knowing they existed near him. So he ran.

Sprinting through the ruins of the city as the sound of chittering seemed to grow louder by the minute, he soon saw why as he rounded the corner of what was once likely a main street. Greenish yellow sacs reminiscent of eggs were embedded into several of the corpses, he could see the material spreading out to cover the bodies, and where one sac had covered a body entirely, he saw a hand covered in a bright yellow chitin burst through as he passed by, clawed and built like that of the Bugman he'd killed, but much larger in size. He kept running until the sounds died down, till they sounded hours away or gone entirely. Whatever those things were, they were spreading through the city. Hatching young through the dead and then letting them gorge on the ones that weren't used. He didn't know why or how they made him feel so enraged and yet terrified, only that they felt to him a natural enemy.

When he finally stopped he could tell they'd lost him, and he could catch his breath. The burns covering him felt taut and tight, aching as he looked down and noted with surprise that they were almost all gone, fresh pink skin covered what had been blistered and scorched just the other day aside from where his left arm would have begun. That was still red and crispy. Not as much though, another interesting factor.

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A look down at his sidearm and the display on it had him scowl. '31,' He'd wasted an extra two shots in his rush. What a stupid thing to do, he hadn't even considered that it may have had others in the surrounding area. He was lucky that he could apparently hear so well, though that raised another set of questions to him. Why was the city so silent outside of the Bugmen that had appeared today? Why had there been ones wearing armor? How many different groups were fighting on this poor planet? His scowl deepened as he sighed and muttering to himself, took in his surroundings. "Questions for another time."

He was standing on top of some sort of ruined aircraft, a fighter of some kind that held the mark of the Imperium on it. Half of it was filled in small holes and sporting miniscule impact marks, and the other half scorched and blackened. He could only make out the word 'Scythe' next to the mark of the Imperium and the ships cockpit appeared to have been shot clean through. Blood was spattered through the inside and a hatch on the side was open. Whether the pilot had survived the crash and injuries somehow, or been dragged out after he couldn't tell with certainty. Likely they were dead with the sheer amount of blood trailing out. He didn't bother following the trail and instead sat against the cockpit for a moment, finally catching his breath as he took note of the hunger pangs rolling through his stomach. Who knows when he'd last eaten, he knew he sure as all hell didn't the day before at the least.

He popped out one of the vials of 'rations' from the leg compartment and eyed the goo inside with distaste. He truly and well didn't want to swallow anything like this, it looked like it belonged on the side of some tree as a mold more then it had any right being food. "Man with nothin' can't be a chooser." He flipped the cap on the vial and unsealed it by pressing his finger through the seal and piercing it, before raising it and downing the entire thing in one go. Horrendous. Terrible. Nasty. He felt like puking, but he managed to keep it down as he felt the itch across his shoulder and arm from the day before start once more. Hopefully it'd keep him going.

M.I.U self repair standing at 50% complete. Estimated time until repair: 39 hours. Warning! Detecting severe corruption in M.I.U Kelxath Neural Matrix! Drift from Imperium protocol is likely upon full reactivation. Advise immediate report to nearest Imperium base to initiate M.I.U Reset.

That was great timing. He had a timer until whatever this thing in his head was activated and it was counting down. He had a surefire time limit to reach those lights and hope to whatever was out there it was an Imperium base and no idea what would happen at the end of it.

He forced himself to his feet, and started following the light through the darkness once more. He didn't have time to rest, for more than one reason.