"Ah I see, this one's mind and body are stronger than I'd originally thought, we'll just have to see about that."
Emily followed behind at an apathetic pace, quietly sobbing while carrying her stuffed toy. Damien noticed how far ahead of her he had gotten, he took long yet quiet strides whereas Emily dragged her feet making small echoing sounds throughout the hallway. "Emily you need to stay right behind me and you need to be quieter." He said in a stern voice. Damien didn't have much experience in dealing with children, he didn't have much of a childhood; having been raised most of his life to be a soldier. He understood how she felt, both having lost their fathers. They walked through the carpeted, dimly lit halls of deck nine on their way to a repair station. That would not be the last of their destinations, not by a long shot. Emily finally caught up to him. "Shhh" Damien signaled his hand in front of her face, several splinters were shambling just a few meters away from them. The creatures did not seem to notice the two, Damien did not want to risk fighting any of them while Emily was near him, but even he knew they'd only be able to stay silent for so long.
They crouched amongst the shadows of the crimson-stained walls and searched for food and water, those were abundant. Bullets and safe refuge however were not. They had found a repair station without alerting any splinters; they were just lucky Damien thought to himself. Damien walked over to the machine; repair stations are open for civilian use not unlike that of a vending machine, they were a combination of a 3d printer and a sewing station. "If only these things could fabricate weapons and ammo; uh hey you might want to look away, oh and if you spot any of them, tell me," Damien said looking into her eyes. Damien took off his armor and uniform and placed them inside. Emily was outside the station, she was on the lookout for any threats. She began to feel nervous, she could hear faint noises in the distance. She felt as if something was crawling under her skin, she itched but couldn't quite scratch it. She jumped up; the jingle of the repair station had startled her, she looked back through the glass. She could see the light emanating from the machine off of Damien's body; she could just make out his dark figure as she peered through the window. Emily lay against the cushioned backrest; a few blinks are all it took for her to fall asleep on the bench.
Damien could hear whimpering from outside, he thought Emily could be in danger. The sound of the door opening startled Emily; There Damien was, clad in dark blue armor, which further made his dark looming figure even more intimidating to her. "Did I startle you?" -"Mmm-hmm" Emily looked up at him and nodded. Kkkshehehe. They heard wet phlegmy cackles coming from the shadowed hallway in front of them, two small black figures walked out from the shadows. Emily looked on in terror; clutching her plush toy as the two small grinning figures walked closer and closer towards them. Damien grabbed Emily's hand and positioned her behind him. "Look away, just close your eyes." Damien lifted his shotgun and cocked it, the two small creatures sprinted towards him, and all she heard were the sounds of shotgun blasts and high-pitched shrieking and crying. Emily opened her eyes to see Damien standing over two small corpses, he then looked back towards her, they were children..."They were."
The two made their way to an elevator and went down to deck six, bypassing what other horrors may be in the decks between. Deck six was one of the few decks that led to the cargo bay where the Ebony was docked. The flooring and walls weren't the nice carpeting and art-covered walls as above but instead had blue steel-plated flooring and tarnished silver walls. The brig here was where the worst offenders were detained and over the last several days, more and more people were kept, he knew to be careful here. Damien after they got a look at their surroundings called Frank to check up on his status. "Frank, are you there?" -"Oh my god, Damien you're still alive? Whatever in the hell happened?" -"I'm looking for the Ebony and Alice if she's still alive."-"You're not gonna leave us all behind are you?" Frank said worriedly.-"No of course not, as much as I'd like to get off this ship, I'm not gonna leave everyone to these monsters, how's everyone at the cafeteria?"- "We're mostly doing fine, though some of us have been feeling sick, those things have mostly left us alone, thank god." -"Good, if I get back I'll have someone tagging along, but for now, I've got to get going. Damien out." Damien hung up and they made their way through deck sixes dark silvery halls. The two came across closed security bars; used for preventing prisoners from continuing further in case of a breakout. Damien shook the bars but there was no point as he could not possibly bend them. There was loud gunfire coming from somewhere around the corner, then loud footsteps and shouting, two marines ran past them then another who was very large with a woman with blond hair. could that be her? He thought as his heart raced.
Damien grabbed the barred gate with both hands and began shaking it violently and shouting at them. "Heeey! Over here!" But they did not seem to hear or see him and they ran off, a large group of splinters came into sight, all shambling and muttering incoherently. Damien slumped down to his knees trying to think of a way to get to them, as he looked up he saw him, the one who caused all of this. That tall, dark skeletal being who spoke to him; he saw the dark being stroll casually through the horde of splinters and gave Damien a glance with that wicked grin, and then he was gone. Damien was deeply disturbed by this, he could not let that thing get to Alice, he would not allow it. Emily saw it too, she was standing there in shock at what she just witnessed. Damien grabbed her and carried her in one arm, he ran down the hall with Emily in tow at full sprint. Damien managed to run around to where the splinters had come from, they had covered the hall with their black seepage. There had to be at least a dozen of the creatures standing there, all motionless as if in a trance.
Damien put Emily down. "Cover your ears." She did as he told her and covered her ears but dropped her toy while doing so, it made a loud plop as it hit a puddle of ooze, and the splinters all immediately turned their heads in their direction. "Ahh shit." He said realizing he no longer has the element of surprise; he aimed through his scope and discharged a 300. RUM into two of the splinter's skulls, obliterating their heads. Emily's ears started ringing from the boom of the rifle. She winced in pain then looked up at Damien walking forward and blasting pieces of flesh off of them. Their gore flew out in all directions painting even more of the hallway with their inky fluid. He bashed one's head into the wall with the butt of his rifle, its head crunched and thick black blood filled out through its caved-in skull. A sickening squelching splat was made when he pulled out the gun from its head that was plastered to the wall. Damien felt a pair of hands grab him and he was faced with one of them. It had an elongated jaw as if it was preparing to chomp his head off. It bit into the gap beneath his shoulder plate. A stream of crimson spewed from his bicep into the creature's eyes; its glassy white eyes were coated in blood."Ahhh mother fucker!" Adrenaline rushed into him, all he could feel was raw fury. He grabbed both sides of its decayed face. then with one quick twitch, he dug his thumbs into its eyes. He dug his fingers into its flesh. sloughing off its face with a ripping motion; the splinter stumbled back then away from him. Damien looked at the detached face and then threw it to the ground in disgust. The splinter turned back towards him and let out a gurgled screech, Damien's vision went red with blood lust as he lunged towards it, he gripped its throat with both hands. All it took was several hard yanks and its head along with its spine came ripping out of its esophagus like a bone on a brisket, blood spewed from the new opening, forming a large puddle on the floor. Damien looked at the spine in his hand, processing what he had just done.
He heard a scream behind him, it was Emily screaming for help as one of the splinters was shambling towards her, Emily tried to run away but tripped in the black blood that stained the floor. She tried to get up but her movements were too frantic to get a grip. She had also dropped her toy. If she was going to die she wouldn't even have a friend to go with her. Emily turned her head around to face the blackened monster that craved her flesh; she braced herself waiting for what will happen next. Emily heard the sound of a bone rattle then as she opened her eyes. She saw Damien wrap the spinal column around its neck and pulled...he pulled Until its neck was crushed. Its head fell to the ground facing her with its ghoulish face. Damien threw the spine aside and picked up Emily's toy, handing it to her. "Sorry, you had to see that, I believe this is yours." Emily took the toy while he helped her to her feet. "Looks like we made a mess of ourselves," Damien said trying to lighten the mood, Emily looked up at him. "You almost look like one of them; I thought you had turned into a monster." She said hugging his side. "Alright let's get out of here." They made their way to the door; Damien's heart was racing again, he'd hoped he would be able to see Alice again.
The door opened to reveal an appalling view of various corpses of splinters and people strewn about, none he could identify at a glance. His heart sunk, could they have survived all of that just to die in this place, or where most of these bodies are already here? "No.no.no.no," Damien said to himself hoping they had not died here, he searched all the human bodies but none of them were familiar to him. Damien noticed that Emily was staring at something; when he walked up to her, he saw what it was. Emily stared petrified of a family that lay on the floor. "Come on, there's nothing we can do for them." Damien took her by the shoulder and moved her away from the awful sight; he felt a sharp pain in his arm when he moved it. After having navigated their way through the hallways and all the splinters between them, the two made it to the elevator to cargo bay one, where they entered the now oddly pristine interior of the compartment.
"Something's not right, this elevator was filthy the last time I saw it." Damien cautiously entered the elevator; it was so clean looking that you could eat off the floor if you wanted to, he pressed the button for deck 4 cargo bay 1. The door closed and they began descending, he felt uneasy but Emily looked like she was more comfortable in there than anywhere else, a music jingle started playing. It was off though; it was not like normal elevator music, it was too melodic and happy to be normal, the panel screen turned purple and his face appeared on it. "Hello and welcome to Umbra'Keshe's elevators, you'll see that this one is much nicer than the one your mate was in earlier. You see. She caught me while I was in the process of 'cleaning it' hehe."-"What are you and why are you doing this...Kesh?" Kesh went from a smiley grin to an unamused expression. "Please it's not like you could understand why I'm doing what I am doing here, think of it as getting rid of the pests that have infested my ship and my planet."- "Your planet?" Are you a...?" - "An Umaran? Yes, and the reason you and your loathsome race have even managed to make it this far, don't worry I won't exterminate your species, just everyone here and I'm going to have oh so much fun doing it. Now welcome to the next stage of the show, this will be the first and perhaps last time we ever speak, now gaze...gaze into the abyss." Umbra'Keshe's face disappeared from the screen and the music ended, the elevator stopped and the door opened. Damien and Emily stepped out of the elevator together. Emily grabbed his arm. "Was that a monster?"-"Yes, yes it is, I've seen some but none like that."
They made their way down the corridor to the cargo bay 1 entrance, as Damien opened the door he saw a group of soldiers by a ship. It was the Ebony; the group noticed them and aimed their weapons, there were three marines and two scientists. "Hold it right there!" "That deep islander accent was unmistakable; it was Tyson.-"Tyson" Damien said to him over the radio. Tyson was dumbstruck to hear it was Damien, he had thought he was dead for sure. Tyson was not too thrilled to find out so abruptly, that Damien was still alive. The two were glaring at each other from where they were, Damien saw her; Alice, she was alive. "Oh my god, Damien you're alive!" She came running towards him, but before she could wrap her arms around him, she noticed all the gore he was covered in and recoiled in disgust. "What...what happened to you and who's that behind you?"-"Um hi my name is Emily." She said shyly.-"Aww how did a cute little thing like you get covered in all of this muck? we should get you two cleaned up." Alice sat Damien down on a crate to clean him off. "Where'd you get this blue armor?" Alice asked while wiping the black stains from his arm.-"I got it from someone I tried to save, unfortunately, I couldn't help him, Sergeant Ross was his name. Emily here is his daughter, her mother well I'd rather not say." As Alice was cleaning his armor, she noticed the bite on his arm.-"Is...is this a bite?"-"Yeah one of them got me; I don't think it's infectious though, not the only bite I got." He said with a chuckle.- "I'll get a medkit."-"No need I got one here." He pulled one out from his belt; he looked into Alice's eyes. "How did this all start?" -"That artifact we brought into the lab, it just activated after hours of testing on it, and then...everything just went to hell." Tears were forming in her big green eyes. "People started turning into those things and attacking people, the shockwave from it was powerful, it felt like it shook the whole ship."- "It did, I felt it from deck 13"-"That's where you were? You came all that way to get here?"-"There and from space; a technician, Simon, and I fixed the comms array, he also didn't make it." Alice gave him a passionate kiss, and he held her closer to him.-"So why did you come down here?"-"Well for one I know the maglev here leads to your lab and that's the only way to get something that big in there, also I saw all of you on deck 6, I tried getting to you but well there was a prison bar door blocking my way." Alice started stitching the wound on his arm; she accidentally poked him in the arm with the needle. "Ouch, careful." She gave him an apologetic look. "This reminds me of when we first met, back on Athena when I got shrapnel in my shin."-"Yeah I remember, idiot, always getting yourself hurt."-"What can I say? It's one of my better qualities."
A marine approached the two. "Tobey? Is that you?" -"Hey man, real shit show we got ourselves into huh?"-"Yeah we have, so where's Herrera? Weren't you and Tyson posted with her?" -"Well Alice here, we bumped into each other like an hour or so after everything went to hell.-"Yeah literally." Alice giggled.-"Well it was dark you know and my flashlight was busted." He said embarrassed, dodging the question. Damien gave him a questioning look. "I don't want to talk about her." His cheery tone turned somber. "We lost a lot of good men getting here, let's leave it at that." Tyson watched the three from the makeshift guard post on top of the Ebony; he looked down on Damien with scorn, if only there was some way of getting Damien out of the way, he had his heavy machine gun if push came to shove. Everyone was almost done packing and prepping the ship for takeoff; Alice was nearly done cleaning off Emily of all the blood on her, as they were all about to enter the Ebony an ethereal sound echoed through the cargo bay. "What the hell was that? Everyone get ready and men, get kinetic." Tyson said aiming his heavy machine gun. A large shadow poured out into the cargo bay from multiple directions, Splinters came rising from the shadows in the dozens.-"You all know how to kill splinters right?" Damien asked the Marines. "Affirmative," They all said in unison. "Good," He said aiming his security rifle, he was all locked and loaded for whatever came their way. "Oh how I love a good last stand, I'm surprised you made it so far. Damien my poor pawn this is where your story ends, it's time to face the music.