Chapter.2:2 Alice
“Pant.. Pant… Pant…”
…
For a while now I have been running with the cube as a torch, searching for the Weapon Storage to no avail… Although once in a while, a creature or two would appear before my burning wrath.
Of course when they do, they would turn into a crispy bacon with a few shrieks that called for more… Not only that, if a lot of them came charging at me, I would cheat by camping behind a door in a apartment, forcing them to come to me and not the other way around.
“Hah….” I heavily sighed in one of the empty apartments, while borrowing some food as I relaxed for a few minutes…
At least I am not stealing right?
But damn… I really need a map for this place.
Even though I have lived here for 15 years, I didn’t really venture out a lot unless it was to the mall, school or workshop. Hell, you could do everything at home at this space station. Not only that, with the infestation everywhere it was really hard to tell the difference between the hallways if you didn’t create a mind map or unless you knew it within the heart.
As I take one bite after another, I could only ponder about my friends if they have survived or not. And about the soldiers being stuck in those room without food, since they must be as hungry as I am. Right?
I stood up from the couch and brighten myself up by boxing the air…
“I can do it… Believe in yourself”
“But first… Another bite on the hard bread.”
“Crunch, crunch,crunch”
“Crack.. crack.. crack..”
Hm? I didn’t know that my bread were made out of glass…
“Grrrrrrr”
Huh? My bread can growl?
Wait.. that’s not my bread…
Quickly I turned around to the source of the cracking sound, which was near the front door to the left of me. What I saw wasn’t the front door but the ugly deformed brownish human like faced creature at front of me.
“KYAAAAA!!!” the creature roared as the creature’s head split in 4 and drool flew onto my face and bread.
Yuck…
Immediately I dropped the remaining bread and aimed my flame thrower at the creature while saying “Say hello to my little friend!”
“FUUUUUU OOSH!!!!”
As I used the modified welder, the creature quickly wriggled away with a shriek and its tail behind its back. Knowing that I couldn’t miss this chance, I tried to follow it with my flame thrower, but my human and untrained legs couldn’t catch up to the creature, especially with the heavy load of power cells and the power cell tube itself. Even though I have shrinked them, the mass were still the same, which was a let down.
“Crap!” I said and stomped the ground and gave out a heavy sigh of failure…
That bitch did it again…
I could count up to over 16 times now and still it just keep spitting drool on my face every time it sees me. What is the real intent of the creature? Just to annoy me or play with me?
Well with most of my power cells gone because of the modified welder that consumed more energy than needed. I went back to the apartment and stocked up my remaining bags, just in case.
...
As I walk through another hallway or rather maze in another floor at sector 16 with the cube, I noticed that the infested tumors have grown back on the way here, even though I had burned nearly all of them down with the welding torch a few minutes ago. Their regrowth capabilities to recover was really strong, I couldn’t help but think that it might be impossible to recover the Ashinova if this kept going and if there was a source to this madness.
Anyways as I move along the hallway trying to find a map, I finally found something else that was worth much more around a dead end corner. A infested gate that looked like no other in a dead end with no handle. Quickly burning of the infested area with a glowing tumour a shriek could be heard from it as it revealed the hidden part behind the purple threads.
I cheered with delight as I could read ”Weapon Storage 2 of sector 16".
"Finally...." I said after trying to find this place for hours.
Trying to find the manual lock somewhere on the door or on the wall, I suddenly heard a few groans and steps getting louder from around the corner of the cross hallway.
Did the tumour call for backup?
Quickly I hid the glowing cube inside my shirt and hid myself in the shadows near a corner, so that whatever was on the way wouldn't notice me. Especially when it sounded like a human who walked through the slimy floor towards me.
...
"Aaaah urg urg" It moaned while making funny noises in a eerie tone.
"Step... Step..."
Human or not it walked really slowly across the infested hallway from the corner.
"Step... Step..."
Suddenly I couldn’t hear any steps anymore, but the moan was still nearby, which what I believe is somewhere at front of me. Poking my head out to inspect what it was without light, all I could see were a twitching silhouette of a child, twitching heavily as it moaned without any sign of stopping.
Staring at it with curiosity for a while, it just kept standing there… Waiting eagerly for something to come out.
A few minutes had passed and yet it still stood there while I watched over it. Thinking that it might be about time to burn whatever was standing there, since all the hints hinted that it wasn’t not something normal. I quietly took out the cube to illuminate the creature together with my welder ready for battle.
"Aaaaah"
With the light illuminating the hallway, I could immediately see what the unknown creature was...
But I regretted ever wanting to see it, because what I saw was a human girl with pitch black holes in the eyes that indicated that there was none in them. Deformed face and tattered clothing that barely covered the decayed body. The zombie like creature kept moaning and started to heavily twitch a lot more than the amount it did before it noticed me without eyes.
"AEERRAAAOOOOUURRR!!!!" It screamed weirdly while crouching a bit.
Suddenly a uneasy and uncomfortable noise of bones breaking, tissues ripping and skin splitting could be heard from the girl’s body that split a few tissues of the skin apart.
"Crack, crack, crunch, squirt"
"Mother of god..." I pleaded.
The girl started to grow an extra pair of arms at the back with claws attached on the hand and her stomach split open which removed the remaining clothings, which also revealed a mouth with disgustingly sharp teeth and intestines hanging out. The head split in two and her real hands also grew a pair of bone claws...
It was an abomination, something that shouldn't exist, something that should have never been born, it must be exterminated I believed firmly.
Right after the creature had made its transformation, it immediately charged towards me while cutting the air with its new limbs and old. It looked funny actually, if it didn’t try to kill me.
"Oh no you don't!"
Quickly I retaliated by firing the modified welder at the monster, which created a large flame that extended to at least 10 meters until it hit the running monster that charged at me.
"AaaaaUUuuuHaaoh" the creature screamed as it got toasted and fell onto the floor with a "Thud!".
Walking toward the deformed human to satisfy my curiosity of it being dead or not. I turned the toasted creature around with my feet and saw that it looked lifeless with its eyelids closed. Not that it had any eyes to begin with. About to give it a last kick for being so ugly, the eyelids suddenly opened and quickly it tried to devour me with the mouth at its stomach, which in reflex I tried to immediately stop at once by breaking my posture that made me fall backwards instead.
“Crap” I said and tried to crawl backwards as fast as possible so that I could create some distance to burn the creature without burning myself.
As I did the creature crawled after me with the help of its extra limbs like a spider. As it got close by the second because my speed wasn’t enough, I retaliated with a few kicks that did nothing but anger it more.
“Screw this!” I ranted and used my welder against the creature, while hoping that my pants would be strong enough to protect me from burning myself.
“AaaaaUUuuuHaaoh" the creature screamed once again as it got toasted and fell onto the floor with face first.
Quickly rolling around to cover my flames with the slime of the infested area so that I could extinguish it. I then stood up and backed off a bit so that I could once again burn the creature that nearly took my life.
“Take this bitch…”
“FUUUUUU OOSH!!!!”
After a while of emptying one power cell, I then noticed that the body of the girl disintegrated and vanished into nothingness…
“Damn, If I meet more of these I might need to cripple them and run instead, unless I want to waste my ammo…”
Now that I have taken care of that with a few brushes on my legs from the slimy goo of the infestation, I then resume to trying to open the door, but then heard a voice instead.
“Who’s there?” Said someone.
“Your savior” I said sarcastically.
“Oh, I bet you can open it manually?” He asked me.
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
“Yeah… Let me search for the lid”
“It should be around the left side of the door” He hinted to me.
“Ah found it!”
As I was about to open the lid for the manual injection of the power cell I could then hear a creature cheer with happiness near me, it was the mantis arms like hybrid snake creature with a large head next to me.
“Kyaa!.. Kyaa!.. Kyaaa!”
“Sorry it looks like you guys will be stuck for a while”
“What?! Wait!”
Staring at the creature who was amusingly laughing with me as I had my conversation with the unknown man behind the door, I quickly aimed the welder at the creature. But as soon as I did, the creature retaliated with a quick slash with the arm of theirs that made me duck for my life and roll away from the dead end so that I landed behind the snaky creature near the hallway.
But instead of shooting right away, I backed of a few meters with a jump that made me roll on the slimy floor, and then aimed the welder. Why? I questioned myself. That’s because the deformed human from before nearly trapped me in that trap, hence from experience, this creature might do the same. And just like I thought, the Snake whipped the tail that made a sonic boom like sound in the air.
“FUUUUUU OOSH!!!!” I soon after fired the welder at the creature.
But no shriek could be heard, just a laugh… “Kyaa!.. Kyaa!.. Kyaaa!”
With a confused face and still standing ground with my flame thrower as the creature wriggled slowly to me. I then knew that the creature had somehow developed some kind of resistance to fire… Was it because of the constant hit and run tactic it did?
No it doesn’t matter… Now I need to run!
Quickly I turned tail as soon as possible to an apartment nearby with a plan I had cooked up before hand in case anything like this happened. Trying to open every door I could, I finally got inside one that was unlocked and went inside while locking the door. Soon after loud bangs on the door could be heard as the creature tried to bash the door open.
“DUN! DUN! DUN!”
Having no time to rest I looked around for something soft, whereas I found a couch that I pushed to place near the second floor rails. As I was pushing, the door suddenly bursted open with a “DUUUN!”, making the door glide on the floor with a metallic sound of a shriek like it always do.
Knowing that I didn’t have a lot of time, I kicked the couch so that it covered the distance I had wanted it to be and right after I ran to the second floor. One of the reason why I knew that this would work was because every apartment in Ashinova barely had any differences unless it was the amount of rooms in them.
“Pant.. pant” I took a few breaths at a dead end as the creature had cornered me at the second floor.
“Kyaa!.. Kyaa!.. Kyaaa!” It laughed as if it had won the battle while wriggling closer and closer to me.
But I just stood there with a big grin of delight, as creature then responded by confusingly tilting its head as if it were thinking along the lines of “What is wrong with this dude?”
I fired the flamethrower at the creature’s head even though I knew it wouldn’t hurt it, but the real reason was to blind the creature, because the flames created by the welder was rather large. Quickly I afterwards climbed the railing and jumped to the couch I had planted on the first floor. I landed with a gentle “thud..” as I quickly continued to fire the flame thrower that could reach at least 10 meters onto the creature’s head.
Blinded by my flame thrower it violently tried to slash everything at front of it, even though I were on the first floor chuckling. As I got closer to the door I sprinted as fast as possible away while the creature were confused of what had really happened, as if it was magic..
“KYAAAAA!” It screamed because of the humiliation I caused as I ran to some random place far away.
…
“Phew…” I sighed inside a locker far away from the incident while resting to regain my energy. Knowing that the creature knew I was fiddling around the big door at front of the weapon storage 2 of sector 16, the first thing it would probably do was to check over there.
“Eheh!” A cute chuckle could be heard as I stood there silently.
Trying to move around to check where it came from in the tight locker, I could then hear someone burst out laughing. “hahahahahahahahahaha!”
“What a stupid creature, hahahaha! slam, slam!” Presumably who I believe to be Alice could be heard rolling around inside the SMB while laughing heavily and hitting... The floor I guess?…
“Alice?” I asked to gain her attention after raising my watch to the front of my face.
As I gazed upon my watch in the dark locker, I noticed that the once red and pulsating marks was now blank of nothingness. Other than that, I could see a cute image of a schoolgirl in a room made out of 3d lights from the SMB. Though what really surprised me more than normal was the astonishing details of different shaders made by one colour. Every little and single detail was made out of the orange colour that is either lighter than the other, or darker.
Looking at the petite girl with a checkered skirt, a shirt with long sleeves and a vest with the “USEE” logo on the right chest. The details were so immense that even lifting the skirt you could sense the mass and the feel of it.
“HEY!” the long haired girl with glasses yelled at me while trying to cover her crotch by pushing her skirt down with her hands.
“Oh.. sorry…”
“You are a rude one aren’t ya?”
“Sorry…” I apologized and poked her with my finger to try if I could, which made her fall backwards down onto the floor and show her cute teddy bear panties…
“Hey!” She yelled and then noticed that she once again showed her panties helplessly, which made her blush or so it seems…
As she stood up, She let out a weird sound like “Uuuuh!” as she pouted indicating that she would hit me or something. With a grin of a delight as if I had found a new toy, I then poked at her once again because it looked like that she couldn’t retaliate against me.
“Hey! Grrr! Take this!” she said while showing her teddy bear panties on the floor and pointing at me.
And just like that my grin quickly turned to a painful expression as I could feel a needle prick my skin under the SMB, which made me bite my lips until I bled as I tried to hold my scream in so that I wouldn’t attract attention. Just like the first time I obtained the Watch my hand once again started to go numb although with less pain than before but still I fell out of the locker onto my knees as I looked at my watch. Looking closely at it while holding in my pain, I could see that the marks once again started to fill up one by one, but this time only until 4 out of 20 was filled with a red pulsating colour.
“I yield” I muttered.
“Hah. It’s good that you now know that I have the power!” She said and retracted the needles.
“Yeah, sorry, besides… The teddy bear is cute…”
Suddenly a strong electric jolt electrocuted me instead of the needles, which made my body twitch heavily around out of reflex.
“Sorry!!” I pleaded to her.
…
“Hahahahaha” I laughed with tears on a bench in the locker room.
“So how old are you?” I asked her.
“15…”
“Ah, the same age as me”
“Well yeah, I was born from your blood”
“Oh? We are siblings then?”
“Kinda, but yeah…”
“Call me Onii-chan?”
“No… rather call me Nee-chan”
“Ah, nevermind I’ll call you Alice-chan” I said while pinching her cute cheek.
"...."
“ARRGH! I yield!”
…
“Alice, my father told me that you held immense knowledge, did you not?”
“Yes, I do Vincent” She said with a image of a floating book hovering above her palm.
“Can you show me the map of Ashinova or just show me the way to the weapon storage room 1 of sector 16”
“Sure” she answered and made a globe with both of her palms. The globe showed the whole architecture of the Ashinova, leaving none left alone. But because of that, I had to zoom in a few times or rather she did it for me.
I let out a “Whoa” in awe because it was so cool.
“Here, let me draw a line from where you are to your destination” She said with a smile after my compliment.
And just like that a line appeared from where I was on the map to where I was suppose to go. Surprisingly it was kinda closer than I thought, I must have wandered around like a maze without checking where I had been…
“Also, I will only appear when you need me, but I can talk, see, hear and sense, depending on the situation even though you can’t see me”
“Good girl” I said while patting her hair gently, which made her blush.
“An.. anyways, if you get lost, just put your hand at front of you and I’ll create a arrow to where you should go…”
“Okay, but first the toilet!” I said like a child with a new toy and proceeded to the toilet in the locker room.
“Wait, Vincent! Don’t! NUEEEE!!!” she screamed for some reason...
…