Never Dead: Beyond Nightmares

I

Day Five...

I know, I skipped the first four days. But you wouldn't be interested in them anyway. Nothing really happened. I found some Lurkers, shot some Lurkers, and shit myself a lot. It was a scary first few days. But now I've got the hang of it.

So let me set the scene for you before I continue on.

I'm all curled up in a corner, counting my ammo, and planning my next move. I'm in a sealed-off room with a hidden exit. A couple of Lurkers are trying to get in, but they're not gonna. Even if they did, I'd be waiting for them.

There are a couple of bodies in the room I'm in, and they don't look fresh. I'm glad my PDT came with an air filter so I don't have to smell them.

My options are simple. My main goal, the one I'm doing all my planning to reach, is to leave this horrid place. I need to get off Io Station and put all this behind me, maybe live in isolation.

But I can't just waltz to the nearest bay and hop on a transport shuttle. No, there's no way that's going to happen. It's not possible. I need to plan out every step, every breath if I want to live.

So I've got a dilemma: Should I just try and find an operable shuttle and get the hell off this place, or should I find a store and upgrade my stuff first, giving me a better chance at survival?

If I go to the store, my journey will be that much longer and I'll have to stay that much more.

But if I go to a shuttle, I might not have enough firepower and defenses to make it.

I'd been debating that problem, endlessly, in my head for the day that I'd been in that sealed-off room, listening to the Lurkers pounding ceaselessly on the door that I welded shut with my plasma pistol. I hadn't really come to any good conclusion yet. I knew I had to get out of the room before the more powerful Lurkers came a-knockin' and busted the door in. But I also knew I needed a plan before I did so, or I might trip up.

So what would it be?

I sat there for another hour before deciding that I'd find a store first, before things got any worse. I stood up and walked to the only access hatch in the room. It led right outside. I would have to kill the Lurkers who were trying to get in, of course, but it was my only option. So I waved my hand in front of it.

It normally wouldn't open for anyone but certified engineers, but I had installed a state-of-the-art hacking chip in my right hand months ago that would unlock all but the most advanced doors. It came in handy in my rather dirty profession - in case you couldn't tell already, I was... not exactly a clean man. So it opened, and I hauled myself in. I crawled down the cramped space and came to the hatch at the other end. Taking a deep breath, I opened it and propelled myself out as fast as I could, raising my line gun as I did so. The Lurkers halted in what they were doing and stared at me as though wondering who would be stupid enough to launch themselves right in front of a Lurker.

I didn't waste any time. I aimed at the closest one, the holographic blue line projected from my gun wavering right where its legs connected to its abdomen. One trigger pull later, and the first one was missing its legs. I did the same to the second one before switching to my more accurate, less powerful plasma pistol to slice their excessively long and sharp arms off. Four quick bursts later, there were two dead Lurkers at my feet. I quickly reloaded both my weapons before heading down the hallway in the direction that I figured might take me to a store.

For the next half hour or so, I walked. And walked. And walked some more. The hallway seemed endless, with hundreds of rooms and other hallways branching off of it. I should've taken the time a while back to install the maps of Io Station into my PDT; it would've made things that much easier to do. But I hadn't, so I was stuck to wandering the Lurker-infested hallways trying to find a stupidly elusive store. Why couldn't they make them closer to each other, and why couldn't they at least hang up signs pointing in the general direction of one?

As I walked, I alternated between thinking about what I'd do when I found a store, and what I'd do after that. I decided that I'd just refill my ammo, healing packs, magnetic modules, and air supply canisters. If there was a bench nearby, I'd weld my copious power nodes - all of them - to my weapons and PDT. Then I'd search for a main terminal, where I could get maps of the Io Station for my PDT. I would also be able to access the cameras and data of certain bays to find an operable shuttle, and make my way to it.

I was something of a computer hacker back before I hopped in my fated escape pod to Io Station, so a main terminal wouldn't pose too much trouble to me when I found it.

As I was walking along, absorbed in my thoughts, I suddenly heard... Human yells? I hadn't encountered a single other survivor in my five days here. So I hurried to find the yells' source. I turned a corner in the hallway and found a gigantic factory bay that had three other, smaller rooms on each of its three walls. The rooms had one glass wall, one door, and an access hatch each. As I watched, an unarmored man, chased by a group of Lurkers, sprinted to the room on the far side of the factory and opened the door. He closed it almost before he got in, nearly crushing himself in the process, and then pumped some plasma into the door's control panel on the inside. Immediately, the blue holographic circle turned orange and began flickering, a sure sign that the door wasn't opening unless it got fixed. But that wasn't enough for the man. He changed the settings on his plasma pistol to "weld" mode and disappeared behind the door. I couldn't see him anymore, but I saw the white, splattering light that was the result of welding come under the door.

After a few minutes, the door was welded shut. The man went back to the glass window and stared at the Lurkers who were frenzying at the door. The man grinned, secure in his safety, knowing they could not break the door. But then one of the Lurkers saw him at the window and launched itself at him. The man jumped back as the Lurker crashed into the window and left a disgusting slimy ooze behind. The man stared at the window in horror. I looked at it too. He was scared of the ooze? But then I saw what he was so terrified about: A crack, small, but a crack nonetheless, had appeared in the window. The rest of the Lurkers followed suit, and soon there was a spiderweb of cracks in the window. I knew I had to do something or the man would become one of them, and then I'd have to kill one more Lurker than the group outside the window. So I raised my line gun and took out the legs of one - two - three Lurkers before they noticed me. I stood my ground and dismembered all of them in quick succession. I switched, once again, to my plasma pistol and began dismembering them, but as they got closer and closer to me I wondered if I shouldn't have just kept on moving.

But then the glass window shattered and the man, holding his smoking plasma pistol, jumped out of it and began firing with astonishing accuracy, taking out the remainder of the group of Lurkers. He then raised his plasma pistol to my face as I did his. We stood like this for a while, neither of us wanting to shoot the only other survivor we had met thus far. And then I called out to him: "Let's put our weapons down and go in one of those rooms. It'll be safer in there."

He nodded and lowered his plasma pistol. I did the same. We walked into one of the other rooms and locked the door behind us.

"We can always get out through the access hatch." I said. He nodded.

"So, who are you?" He asked.

"No. First, who are you? I just saved your skin, I deserve to know first." I replied.

"Fair enough," He shrugged. "I am - or was - a Marine engineer. My name - or what you should call me - is Gunner. I was, as you can probably tell, a pretty good shot. Hell, I still am."

"And my name is Terrick. I was a miner. But I was also a... high risk trader, if you understand my drift." I replied. "But let's put our pasts behind us and focus on the situation at hand. You don't have a PDT. I can help you find a store, if you can help me find a main terminal."

"What do you want do do with a terminal?" Gunner replied.

"Well, for one, I want to download a map of Io Station so I can tell where I'm going. For two, I want to use its access to the main computer system to pull up images and information on various docking bays so I can find an operable shuttle and get the hell off of here."

"Well then... You've got a deal. We'll stick together until we find an operable shuttle." Gunner said, holding out his hand.

"You won't get off this place with me?" I asked as I grasped his proffered hand. He shook his head.

"I've lived here all my life. The only time I left the place was to go on a short mission to one of the asteroids to destroy it, because it was on a crash course with Io.

"So it's fitting that I stay here to die, don't you think?" Gunner said with a sad look in his eyes.

"The only way you're going to die is by being mauled to death by one of those things." I tried to convince him to leave with me, but he refused. Finally, I sighed and gave up. "Well, we're safe enough here. Might as well get some sleep." I walked to the room's control computer and hit a few commands. The lights flickered out.

"Good night." Gunner said as he tried to find a comfortable position in the dark.

"It's ten in the morning." I replied, grinning to myself. "But good night all the same."

***