“Sir, can you understand me?” asked Captain Miller offering out his gloved hand. “We’re the Welcome Wagon if you need help escaping this craft. We can get you out and get you to a medic. You're from Lazarus, right?”
Nothing but a single long groan came from the black, sludge-covered man before him.
“Captain, judging by the state of the others we’ve encountered so far. It’s safe to say he’s probably been contaminated,” said Jackson moving to prime his exo suit heavy rifle.
“He’s not hostile yet, Lieutenant.”
“Yet,” scoffed Munroe.
“What’s your name?” asked Webber stepping forward.
The man’s head jerked up and his hands clenched and unclenched repeatedly until he finally answered, “Vasha… “
“Say again?” asked Miller.
Vasha Ten’!” The man roared as he blinked out of existence.
Webber had stood closest to him and could barely react as the blurred man returned abruptly, covering the distance between them like it was nothing. The man had no time to react to the monster whose shadow he now lived in. The burst of aetherial fire burst through his chest and took what breath remained from his lungs.
“Take him down!” commanded an enraged Captain Miller.
Despite a myriad of shots from their weapons. Most of them missed as he weaved backwards, almost taunting their innate weakness as a group of blanks. When he next appeared, his new target was Munroe. It fell upon Lieutenant Jackson at that moment to engage the experimental features of his exosuit and tap into some of what the Morte aether cores offered. He accelerated forward as the Deterrent Mortan moved to strike down Munroe. Jackson caught the wrist of the Mortan before it made its mark.
“Not happening,” growled the man.
The Mortan gritted its teeth together before managing to warp backwards from the enhanced grip of Lieutenant Jackson. It darted once more back at the Lieutenant and swung wild in hopes of catching the man, but Jackson was able to use the suit to push himself away from the hot blade. He planted the barrel of the heavy rifle into the centre of the Mortan and fired. The rounds not only made their home in the Mortan’s body but they staggered him back, the holes around his stomach, dribbling black and red blood. His body worked overtime to create a Morte scab layer.
Miller took the initiative once more. “Pull back and switch to frags.”
The Welcome Wagon pulled back and pulled pins. A series of grenades landed close to the stunned Mortan. It appeared to disintegrate in the following explosion, and the Welcome Wagon made sure to be outside the worst of it, as chunks of the monster landed all around them.
“Will not die… will not die…” The deep voice gurgled from the lingering smoke.
“How the hell is it still alive!” shouted the Lieutenant.
“Sheer fucking will,” said Munroe. “Fuck that, you don’t get to kill one of us and still be standing.”
‘I agree,’ came a voice from the emptiness surrounding them.
“Vadir?” Questioned Miller. “Where are you?”
‘The Other Side, I’ll explain when you get back, he has what we need. Just hope your little display didn’t destroy it.’
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“The access key, damn it. We had no way of knowing, Kor,” said Munroe.
‘I know, the Other Side picks up electrical signals. I can sense the key’s inbuilt beacon. I’ll put the Mortan out of its misery.’
“How, when you aren’t even here?” asked Lieutenant Jackson.
#
Vadir stood in the grey, decaying other side. Both a dream and nightmare all rolled into one. The residual soul auras of the Welcome Wagon each were represented as strange glowing orbs. Except for Webber who sat close to the nearby wall.
“You took your sweet time.”
“Sorry, had to fight off a mental incursion of my own.”
“I miss when the enemies I fought didn’t have all these weird mental powers.”
“I understand,” said Vadir as he stepped past the downed man, to now stand before the downed fluctuation before him.
The hybrid soul before him was in a war of its own and the human side would soon lose or split from the Mortan remnant. Vadir knelt close to the head of the man and reached out, touching the forehead. He engaged something he had never tried before but had heard rumours of. Rend. A more aggressive trace that not only learned all it could from the target but wormed its way into the soul or body leaving them vulnerable to a purge that left nothing left. Through the hybrid soul, he was able to connect to the body and the symbiote as it tried to repair itself.
‘You would seek to end us.’
‘You are a blight upon this world. You take the living and turn them into puppets.’
The creature laughed in the mind of Vadir and appeared as a spectre close to his shoulder. Only visible to him but he felt its strong presence fighting to flip the effect of Rend. ‘And whose fault is that, child of my enemy.’
‘Only yours.’
The deep throaty laugh made Vadir shiver. ‘First there is separation…’
The hybrid ceased its fluctuation and splintered into two distinct forms. One a man had been forced to embrace the monster. And the other was the monster itself trying to claw its way back to him. Vadir stood up as two vaguely humanoid forms stood opposite him.
‘I’m me again,’ said the human. ‘I thought that was it, I would be its host forever.’
‘You’re not safe yet, I can’t bring you back to what you were but I can help you pass on.’
‘Do what you need to do, because of this thing I killed my father. In death, I can be at peace. I can find them.’
‘The Other Side is not the easiest to navigate.’
‘I’ll find a way.’
‘It was supposed to be just a hostage situation. Lazarus was never meant to become a haven for things like you. I had to watch my friend die while you wormed your way into my body. It’s Vadir Kor right, purge this monster and release me.’
Vadir nodded and approached the bound monster. He placed both hands on the creature's writhing head. ‘Purge.’
#
The man’s body finally came to a stop and Vadir’s echoing voice returned. ‘It’s done, it shouldn’t be getting up any time soon. The access key is on his body, find it then come back to us.’
Even if Captain Miller trusted what the alien said, he had dealt enough with Mortans to know they never just stayed dead or down. Those that remained advanced past the body and scanned the corridor that the man had come from. Miller crouched beside the body and rummaged around until he found the strangely shaped access key, “I’ve got what we came for, time to head back to the shuttle.” The sudden eruption of noise from beyond the corner became a crescendo. “Welcome Wagon, fallback! We’re about to have company.”
Jackson and Munroe moved back as the first of the Mortans appeared from where the man had come from, tall, bearing claws and with bristles along their bulging bodies. They bared their bloody teeth and as they all charged, two of them were stunned in place.
‘I can only hold them for so long, run!’ came the strained voice of Vadir Kor.
Jackson opened fire aiming to cut open the bodies of the oncoming horde. Munroe followed also while Miller watched their front. The spray of bullets was enough to stall the monsters until they reached the shuttle and climbed aboard as Vadir woke up. Not wasting time he hurried to the shuttle's controls and imputed the request to head to the archives. The remaining members of the Wagon offered cover fire to keep the monsters from advancing, aiming at arms or legs to slow down the advance.
“Archives first, then we blow this ship to the Other Side," said Vadir.
The shuttle burst forward heading back the way they came as a great number of monsters flooded the platform.
“Who was he?” asked Captain Miller. “The guy we took the key from.”
“An unwitting tool for people who only saw him as disposable. He’s at peace now.”
“I figured as much. Let’s get this data then blow this craft to hell. These monsters can’t be allowed to spread beyond this ship.”