| abstract | - Rhyler adjusted his spacesuit as he glanced at the status screen. Pressure had been lost completely to 3 of the 5 cargo decks. He pulled up the thermal readings. A huge number of warm entities were moving towards the crew quarters. Alarms blared, and lights flashed, bathing the corridor in red light. This could not be happening. He rushed down the corridor, sealing every hatch behind him. He finally reached the bridge. It was eerily quiet, as all of the crew were dead. Rhyler stopped and rubbed his temples. The ship had been halted the day before, when some issues with the onboard networking arose. Rhyler was deep in the bowels of the ship running CAT5 hypercyber cable while the rest of the crew were checking the cargo holds and the chief engineers were tuning the hypercore. When Rhyler emerged from the access tunnel, there was no one to be seen. His interlink communicator hadn't been working while the network was down, so he went and looked in the main cargo hold. He could not believe what met his eyes. Every crew member was dead, and being consumed by space locusts . Where could they have come from?! He froze as one of the locusts saw him. Its fangs glistened with blood and mucus as it alerted its brethren to Rhyler's presence. Rhyler ran to the door and sealed it behind him. Dozerns of locusts thrashed against the door as rhyler struggled to turn the locking mechanism. He dashed to his quarters, and grabbed his storage pack. It contained his few belongings and inventions. He then ran to the armoury. He grabbed a couple of laser pistols, and a laser carbine. These ones had a 10MW violet pulse diode that could put a hole through almost anything. He also collected some power cartridges. Now for armour. He unlocked a cabinet containing his uberARM v3,0. It had a black and green paint job, and with it, he could survive for up to 5 weeks in space. Its Creatinium shell could withstand lasers, lava, plasma and most magic. After stepping into it, he put on the helmet, which then retracted around his neck. He walked carefully to the bridge, laser carbine brandished. He entered the bridge to reach where he was now. Rhyler opened his eyes. He had to land somewhere, fast. He stepped over to the command console and typed. The computer hummed as it analysed his query. The computer beeped and a result came up. Rhyler typed. The computer pinged as it returned info. Rhyler typed frantically. It would have to do. Setcourse=Aef The engines roared into life and the ground rumbled. Rhyler pulled up the heat map again. Thermalmap=open The locusts were on the move, breaching hatches as they rampaged, hungry for flesh. Rhyler made the decision. He would jettison the cargo in the infected hold, hopefully sucking some locusts out. There was a roar as several tonnes of cargo were sucked out into deep space. The heat map showed far fewer locusts. The hatch sealed, and the ship continued its journey to Aef.
|
