The ventilation shaft above her buckled inward.
The sound was enormous. Metal screaming. Bolts shearing. The ceiling deforming around the impact point, panels caving, and the creature was through before the debris had finished falling — dropping into the room between Reynolds and the nearest table, its head sweeping back and forth before it reached its full height.
The room erupted into panicked shouts. Asher yanked Levi against him and drew his weapon as the hum in Levi’s bones became deafening.
Metal fingertips grabbed Reynolds before she got her side arm out and she swung at the creature. Her fist connected with its dish-like face and she let out a shout, and Levi just watched in horror as it began to turn her, the apertures cycling.Look away Levi. Look away. You don’t have to watch again.
Asher fired. The bolt hit the creature’s torso, its gray, translucent skin flashing where the impact landed in a ripple of something that wasn’t pain, and the creature didn’t react. It didn’t flinch or turn, its attention stayed on Reynolds and its fingers kept working.
“Get out of here!” Tyler yelled, shoving Maddie and Owen towards the door before he charged at the creature. The creature’s free arm swept sideways and caught him across the chest and Tyler hit the wall and went down. The metal finger tips then grabbed the back of Reynolds’ uniform.
Levi lunged and grabbed Jasper’s arm with one hand and Asher’s with the other, forcing himself to turn away when she started screaming. “STICK TOGETHER. RUN. NOW.”
The room broke. People running — not organized, a panicked mass flowing toward the far exit. Levi pulled Jasper, Maddie grabbed Owen’s collar, Elliot had Tyler yanked to his feet and kept shoving crew members toward the door and out into the corridor, the alarm still pulsing.
The door sealed behind them.
The vibration in Levi’s sternum lessened and Asher kept pulling him, further away from the door, further from the chaos, and Levi didn’t let go of Jasper as his mind spun. He had felt it when it was through metal plating and above them. He could track it. But what did they want? What were they looking for?What did the game want him to do with them to make the game end?
It wasn’t hunting her. It was looking for something, and when it doesn’t find what it’s looking for, it moves on. When it does find it...
“Okay. We regroup. We need to—” Elliot began as they moved down the corridor.
“We need to stay together!” Levi shouted above the alarm and the panicked voices. “Nobody goes anywhere alone.”
The corridor was quiet except for the alarm. Reynolds had stopped screaming. Seventeen creatures were loose on a ship Levi barely understood, and the captain was gone, and every eye in the corridor was turning toward the specialist who wasn’t really a specialist. Asher squeezed his hand and whispered, “You got this.”
“So what do we do?” Jasper gasped, stopping for a moment to place his hands on his knees as he caught his breath.
Levi didn’t have an answer yet. The ventilation shafts were not safe, the weapons they had didn’t work, the creature looked at them hiding in a closet and chose not to come in, the vibration, the specific way they killed…it was all pointing to something, but Levi didn’t know enough about the scenario to figure it out.
“Dude, you have to make a decision eventually, otherwise you’ll never get to the fun parts,“ Ethan once said to him. Levi had been frozen with indecision over what to do while playingDisco Elysiumand Ethan wouldn’t even give him a hint. Eventually he did make a decision—he tried to turn on the lights and his character died of a heart attack at the beginning of the game. Ethan laughed so hard he cried that night. “It’s okay. Just start over, and now you know one thing you shouldn’t do.”
I know what not to do. Let’s find out what else I shouldn’t do.
“We move,” Levi said. “Together. Toward Engineering. I need to see how this ship works.”
10
Analog
Everytimetheycrossedfrom a powered section into a dead one, the amber swallowed them and Levi’s eyes had to readjust.
“The grid is divided into twelve sectors,” Owen said, his fingers moving faster than his mouth could keep up with as they moved. “Each sector draws from a central power reserve — when one demands more, like a purge, it pulls from adjacent sectors first, then the general reserve, which is why the lights keep—”
“The cascade,” Jasper interjected, not looking up from his terminal. “Power draw cascades through adjacent sectors. I’ve been watching it.”
“Yes, exactly, the cascade — and when one thing eats power, everything around it gets hungrier.”
“What does that mean for the doors?” Levi asked.
“The doors are electromagnetically sealed,” Owen said. “They run on the same communications relay as everything else toengage the magnetic locks. When the cascade hits, the doors closest to the purge lose their seal for about—”
“Six seconds,” Jasper finished. “Every time a purge fires, the adjacent doors drop for exactly six seconds, life support decreases, and comms go down. Then the power comes back and the seals re-engage.”
They don’t actively try to tear through a door…but they broke through containment. There has to be a reason.
“What about the vents?” Levi said. “If sealed doors stop them…”