The storm had turned the incandescent rays of the sun into a waning crack on the sky. Torrents of wind howling manically almost rendered me deaf. They were the harbingers of a flood that tested humanity's will to live everytime it came. The sky would hail, the ground would break open and spew out seas. And all who were caught in it met a miserable end. A worry swam on my face. And it wasn't out of place.
The entire expanse, as far as the eye could see, was plain. When the waters erupted, there would be no place to run to. Swimming too wasn't an option. Prolonged periods of stay in the water was known to corrode skin as efficiently as acid would. Maybe even more so.
The rumbling thunder paled my face. My cohort and i, five in all, had been employed as excorts to an S.I.M operative, tasked with the job of keeping him safe until we reached the other facility. We had already failed our part, but refused to let the mission suffer as a result of our incompetence. Less than half way there, we had already encountered complications. The operative, by name Magnus, had bled out from a misfired bullet wound, and we were well on the way to being wiped off the face of this dead planet. A drop of rain trickled down my face. It stung.
I turned to my team. I was disheartened, tired, frail and ready to give up. And everyone else was too. The air thickened with grief and weighed down on us heavily. Tears gathered in my eyes, but i was too weak to cry. I had promised, i had failed. I could remember the reluctance in my mother's eyes when my cabin set off. She was unwilling to let me plunge into the maw of the world. But what could she do, when the S.I.M wanted it so?
I gulped down hard. Forced will smothered. In this world, only one truth remained. And it was death, and it's inevitability. But even the inevitable could be delayed. I was about speaking, when the earth tremored. Loose particles of blackened sand hopped momentarily, then again and again. Something was getting closer. Haste and fear danced in my eyes. Instinctively, we reached for our weapons and formed a pentagon. The glinting copper case laid at the dead center.
The crack had shrunk, and visibility with it. My fingers had become quite nebulous. " Stay sharp" i whispered, too afraid to shout. With each new tremor, i gripped my gun tighter. Luckily, the rain had yet begun. But sooner than later they would. I wasn't in a hurry, i hoped for a beast to lunge at us. Its presence was my only hope of survival, even though it would be hungry for my blood. Time slowed down. I felt a sense of paralyzing dread.
"Watch out!!" Elvis screamed. I turned to his voice as sharply as i could and beheld the black mass hurling towards us. Elvis barely bent, his short stature had more often than not gotten him out of most troublesome situations. His silky black hair grazed against the charcoaled boulder as it whizzed past him. I didn't have enough time to react. I had barely completed the turn when i was swept away. My eyes slid back, just below the point of fainting. The PRH dynamic made sure of that.
I skipped across the uneven ground, shifting a couple of bones in the process. I groaned weakly. In the few hours i had been out of the citadel, the horrid nature had treated me like a ragdoll too many times. Bullets fired rapidly, their lethality lighting up the sky. Another bolt flashed, thunder cackled. In the waning light, a figure was tossed up, yelling loudly as he spinned. Blood rained down from his body. It was Elvis.
From over thirty feet, he dropped down disoriented. I sprang up, overcoming the pain sheer will. I blitzed towards him, but missed the catch by a second. I landed on the dirt with a dying Elvis. He wasn't lucky enough to have a PRH dynamic. He was doomed to die. I scampered around him, ripping his vest open. Mangled flesh followed. Elvis huffed in gags. The monster had rearranged his insides with a simple strike. I became more tense.
"Breathe, breathe , take in deep, calm down". I opened his trouser zip and yanked out an injection. Seeing this, he wedged his tongue in-between his teeth. I stabbed his side and pushed the fluid down the needle. A shriek echoed. But Elvis had been silent. Perplexed, i looked to my left. The standing figures looked like shadows. Especially the one that looked like a minotaur in their midst. It had jagged bones protruding from its elbows and canines that were comically big.
It moved like a game glitch, seemingly phasing in and out of space. The other three people scurried back as they fired bullets that were destined to miss. The ones that did hit, were shrugged off by the beast with minimal effort. The sky roared again. We had to end this, and end it fast. By the time i turned back to Elvis, he was dead. Something pulsated in me. The tears i had been so desperately holding burst the dams of resistance and gushed forward. He had died with neither a smile nor frown, but a trace of sadness on the wrinkles of his face. He was born a few years before I was, from an aspiring family. Despite the fiends that plagued the world, they still believed they could live a comfortable live. By the time i had met him, he was thirteen. He would go on and on about his aspirations, with a glint of excitement on the corners of his eyes. None of which he got to achieve.
The pain i felt at that moment was indescribable. My very soul seemed to have been wedged apart. And it almost became literal. I felt my spine move a notch up as the monster rammed into me. Even in the consuming darkness, the creature was as clear as day. It was even more appalling than i thought. Decay and burns blended into a coat on its scaly skin. Blood rolled down its broken flesh, marking it with a vile stench.
It screeched in discomfort. It tried holding its face, but its physique didn't permit such an action. Upon further inspection, i saw that its eyes had been gored out somehow. Gasping in pain, i rolled to my feet and picked up my gun. A moment later, tge bullet slammed into its skin, barely denting it. I wasn't surprised. It lunged at me again. A mad frenzy glowing in its eye sockets.
I planted my feet firmly on the barren soil, pushing my arms out with all muster able strength in anticipation for the attack. The beast crashed into me with almost a tonne of force. I gagged while flying back, my ribcage had flattened. I landed disgracefully, scrapping against the rocks yet again. Lightning flashed. In the moment the darkness receded, i saw a figure standing a little distance away. It was the husky man that had been hired to be incharge of the escorts. He roared, maxing his voice out to beat the sound of thunder.
"It's using sound to determine your location" He said while running aimlessly. He continued " shift in space after every noise". It was an ingenious plan no doubt, but he wasn't PRH enough to execute it. With the bugged movement of the beasi, the man could barely avoid it. Even his heavy footsteps were loud enough to reveal his position for a spilt second.
A second drop of rain landed on me. The weather was being compassionate with these many warning. Unfortunately i couldn't pay heed. I picked the gun again and shot at its leg. I missed, but saved the husky man. Because the beast was now after me. I doubted i could take another ragdolling. Swiftly, i rolled out of its way.
It caught my leg and tossed me into the air. I shivered from my fear of heights but remained silent, overcoming my will to scream. I fired another bullet, upside down. It nailed the the beast's collar bone, forcing it to groan in a deep hum. I forced a turn, facing upright at the last second. My legs buckled at the fall. Bones collided, my ligaments could only do so much.
It turned to me, then blitzed...
***
I lowered my eyes to the wound, frozen with disbelief. My legs trembling with fear. I would have been dead at least a dozen times already if not of circumstance. I tightened my muscles, padding my insides. The jagged spike was still lugged in my lower abdomen, causing me pangs for every inch i shook. The beast was directly in front of me, swaying from side to side.
The unprotected eye socket was the perfect opportunity at hurting the gladiator, and the husky man took it perfectly. The beast's shoulders slumped as it conversed in agony. But it wasn't dead yet. Wincing, I jumped back, breaking contact with spiked bone. I missed my footing and fell flat. Desperation washed over me. This was more than I could handle, I needed help.
And unfortunately, the husky man couldn't provide any. He stood a marginal distance away, shifting carefully to avoid sound. He shot once a while, distracting the beast but not harming it.
All the aids I had been given to facilitate protection had been lost after the first strike. And i doubted i could find them, considering the fact that it was getting increasingly hard to see.
I forced adrenaline to flow through my limbs, rolling out of its strike path with crude motion. It barely missed. Dirt and dust shot up, finding its way into my eyes. Even with eyes closed, the lightning flash was blinding. Thunder roared...