Red Means Dead

All I See is Red

Everyone knows of the fight or flight response when faced with a harrowing situation. Few know there are two other reactions: fawn and freeze. It is the latter that I find myself locked in. No matter how much my brain tells my body to move, it simply refuses.

Meiying had been ripped from my arms in the initial surge and I had reacted, trying stubbornly to save her after the first strike when something-- a claw? teeth? weapon?--ripped her apart at her spinal column. I held my hands over the wound, trying to hold intestines and organs in, not able to understand that it was already too late. A second pass of the creatures yanked her from me, her head tumbling away and over the edge of the precipice and the mangled remains of her body tumbling a few meters from me.

The initial attack by the humanoids was vicious, calculated and deadly. Mei is not the only body on the ground.

The young ensign who had been so clumsy in his advances toward me is still on his feet, phaser in hand, shooting wildly at our attackers. He looks no more able with a weapon than he did with courting me but his frenetic tactic has wounded several of the enemy and killed two. McCoy is wedged behind the shuttlepod, weapon in one hand, communicator in the other. I can't hear him from here but I can tell he's shouting. His eyes frantically dart around looking for something--enemy, escape, I don't know. He could easily duck into the shuttlecraft and save himself but he doesn't and then his eyes find mine and instantly I know why he's not saving himself.

I motion emphatically, trying to make it very clear to save himself, to not worry about me but he shakes his head, firing off three rapid shots as he skirts around his safe haven.

A guttural scream far more animal than human forces my attention away from McCoy and I turn my head in time to see the claw if one of the aliens punch a gapping, bloody hole through the young ensign's abdomen, its fingers wiggling in my direction as if it were waving nonchalantly.

Belatedly, my eyelids slam shut but the image of the young man looking down at his own demise is seared into my brain and I play it over a thousand times before forcing my eyes open again.

All I see is red.

I've lost McCoy in the melee, he may very well be dead now, everyone else is. There are a dozen of them left, several of which are savagely eating one of the scientist's bodies who is not entirely dead yet and the others are stalking around ape-like on their knuckles, looking for an adequate meal.

They haven't seen me yet and it isn't until shaking myself from my frozen state and looking down that I understand why as I find Meiying's blood and gore covering me. I must look dead to them, motionless and pail with shock.

I might as well be dead--the only one still alive in the landing party, the only one that hasn't put up a fight. Yet.

Pulling my weapon, I check the power--only 30 percent, hardly enough for a firefight but maybe enough to make it a challenge for them. Spinning the setting to kill, I'm struck with a macabre idea and I force it one more click further, acknowledging the groaning, wheezing hum of the device now set to overload and eventually explode. It starts to warm in my hand, a failsafe reminder of what I've done but I grasp it tighter, hoping to sear the small Starfleet insignia into my palm in tribute to the organization I'm so proud to be part of.

With unknown strength, I rise shakily to my feet and let out a piercing whistle, gathering their attention like flies to honey.

They eye me, ferocious and insatiated and I'm given my first real look at them.

They stand two and a half meters tall, their murky, translucent skin looks like vile puddle water with disturbing black worms slithering just under the outer epidermis. Rheumy eyes bug out of faces mangled with rage and savagery and some sort of self-mutilation with shards of the rock piercing various parts of their skin.