Tracy shielded his own gaze as the towering King draped in a tattered mantle reached out and plucked up a handful of worshipers. The moment his dead fingers touched them, a sulphurous cancer spread, riddling their bodies with gaping pock marks. Soon the yellow King siphoned all life and vitality from their flesh and bones. They crumbled into piles of hoary yellow ash.

The remaining followers dogpiled atop one another, clawing and scraping ahead, fighting for the opportunity to nourish their dying King with their last heartbeat.

Tracy shuddered at the surreal vision he beheld, images that would burrow into his mind forever.

The boy kept tugging at Tracy's arm, trying to see, to understand the exciting noises echoing around them, but the marshal held him close, shielding his innocent mind from the horrors that could break him. Even Chasm began to prance in place, made skittish from the auditory overload.

Amidst the chaos, Roy retreated away from the slaughter, making his way towards a corridor, his unholy work complete.

Tracy had witnessed enough. This had evolved from a simple fugitive capture mission into a scene that unsettled him to the core. And this was no place for a child. What had he been thinking? He hadn't. He'd let his passions get the best of him. And falling headfirst on that rock probably didn't help.

He directed Chasm back around the way they'd come, but he found the corridor barred by two crouching creatures, each held up by six muscular feline legs. They lurked in the shadows, waiting to pounce on him.

With a holler he slapped the scabbard compartment within Chasm. The railgun launched out and he caught it as he lept off of Chasm's back. He cocked the lever and pulled the trigger again and again, sending blast after blast into the tendrilled beasts. Cords exploded under the rifle fire, splattering the walls and the floor with oozing ichor. Still the feeling fibers wove and wrapped about his arms, flinging him into a slanted wall, and sending his Model X4 sliding across the floor out of reach.

He shook off the dizzy spell only to find one of the beasts edging toward Chasm and Ashton. With a roar he pulled Judge from his holster, clasped a waving tentacle and shot it at the base. The tentacle recoiled, ripping Tracy off his feet, launching him towards the thing's body as he intended. As he flew through the air in an arc, he willed his smartarm finger to shift into a plasma cannon. Tracy landed on the thing's back even as it opened it's maw exposing rows of fangs. Throwing all his might behind his shifting metal hand, he punched it into the back of the creature's sleek head. The force plunged his arm inside, puncturing oil-slick skin, down to his elbow. His arm glowed as a muffled plasma blast scorched the beast from the inside.

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The alien monster uttered a final hiss before collapsing and dying on the floor.

Tracy rose, his back to the other beast, alien gunk evaporating in sickening fumes rising from his cannon hand. He spun on the remaining threat, green pupils burning, putting himself between the beast and the boy. It wouldn't touch a hair on Ashton's head. Not on Trace's watch.

The fanged thing hissed, but shrank away, tentacles folding in, like a beaten mutt hiding its tail between its legs. Tracy stood his ground and leveled the hand cannon. The glowing end pulsed as it gathered charge for the next shot.

But as he held his arm still, the thick thumping of many footfalls echoed through the antechamber. The floor shook, almost making Tracy's knees knock.

A whole pack of the tentacled beasts emerged from the shadows, amber eyes aglow, fangs dripping, barreling towards him.

He hefted Judge in addition to his finger canon. The Model X4 lay way out of reach. A pang of self-loathing gnawed at his insides. Shouldn't have destroyed Jury. His jaw clenched tight.

Was he seeing things? Tracy squinted. The new aliens looked odd. Almost as if they had shriveled humanoid limbs in addition to the tendrils and powerful legs. Ragged tattered garments draped over their warped forms.

It only made the marshal desire to shoot the abominations even more.

Tracy's well-placed shots hit all of their intended targets. But there were too many in a confined space.

He couldn't ground them all.

"Git, Chasm," he commanded, hoping the steeder would understand to flee with haste and transport the boy to safety. But he knew deep down that wish was a pipe dream. The steeder was smart, but not that smart.

A torrent of glistening flesh, living whips, and muscled legs overpowered him.

He was yanked up as fast as he went down, wrapped up in the vine-like appendages of the monsters and carried into the throne room.

Tracy strained against the living cords. Shot a few off too. But not before the creature flung him to the slate stone floor. Waves of pain spread over his body as he attempted to claw his way to his feet.

As his eyes trailed up the infirmed frame, the bronze-masked face hiding in the crook of a yellow hood made bile creep up Tracy's throat.

Tracy reeled away. Terror seized his soul.

The nightmare that haunted him in the black before dawn, that early morn' on Jorah's homestead, unfolded before him.

But unlike his night terror, Tracy realized he was not alone. Ashton was beside him, just standing there. Frozen in place. Discarded by the beasts as an offering of innocence.

Thorn-tipped fingers reached for the boy.

A guttural yell exploded from Tracy's throat. "No."

The marshal lunged between the child and the oncoming touch of death.

He felt the hand catch him in a cold iron grip. Then darkness overcame him.