Game Over, Man!
Posted on Sun Aug 8th, 2021 @ 6:58am by Alden Loxley & Jonas Bailey & Whit
Mission:
I Ain't Fraid of No Ghost...
Location: Gaishan Settlement, Ghost
Timeline: November 1st - 3hrs after landing
They'd stepped over the fresh corpses of those distant gunfire noises, violated remnants of what had once been human, gnarled broken hands grasped about firearms. They'd picked up the trail Whit had been following since they'd left Santo for Ghost in all those days past. And now... Now they stood at the entry point to the aftermath of another nightmare.
Circular in form, this room on the lower levels of the Gaishan hab was dark, bare, windowless and cold. Lit only by the three men's torches, was a central well leading down into a subterranean depth unreachable until they stood right at its very edge and lowered a torch downwards.
The main focus of their current attention, however, was the large, muscular man wrapped in a weighty anchor chain hanging upside down above said deeper level. This chain was ratcheted to a crank at the edge of well's perimeter and locked off in position by a level. The only sounds in here besides the three men's breathing was the slow drip of blood and the faint chink of chain as the body moved slightly by virtue of its dangling position.
"This your buddy?" Alden winced as he asked the Shepherd, finally breaking the silence he, Jonas and Whit had been coveting.
A low moan emanated from the unfortunate fella in apparent response.
Whit made a slow approach, watching the walls and angles as much as the guy on the chain. "Coop..." he said slowly. "Is that you?"
Nothing else moved in the darkness, nothing visible at least, but inside the suit, every hair on Alden's skin currently stood on end as Whit moved closer to the bound man. He winced in readiness as Whit asked his question, but the response was quiet and anticlimactic.
"Ge'me'down..." mumbled the upside-down body.
"Màn man lái," Whit said as his hand came out from his belt. With a few flicks of the wrist, he'd unfolded a butterfly knife. He ran the tip down the chain until he found a weak link. "Lucky for you, the Good Book says to leave the 99 smart sheep and go after the one dumb enough to get himself trussed up." After finding a loose link, Whit grunted as he pried it apart enough to let it slip. "Aha!"
The chain slid loose with a grating rattle, dropping the man into a heap on the ground.
Alden looked to Jonas, raised both eyebrows and then stepped backwards as the chain shifted position about that dangling form. He wasn't sure what to expect - finesse or carnage - and neither happened.
It was a long way down, and then a grunt echoed slightly in that lower space beneath them. A muffled curse was then followed by barely legible words. "C'rupt we claim."
"Guess we go down and get him?" Alden half-asked, half-stated.
Whit held up a stalling hand. "Coop?" he called down the hole. "You need a hand or are you good?"
Somewhere in the darkness there was a grumbling voice and a shuffle of person against stone. "... blood of the wicked.... like a river..." said a voice from the depths, followed and surrounded by movement and sounds of muted complaint and discomfort.
Alden rolled his eyes, and in the immediate absence of a decision either way, opted towards further investigation. He swung the support level close enough to the edge that he could hook the dangling heavy chain with his hand, but then looked to Whit - "C'mon, man needs he..." - only to be interrupted from below.
"Better come down 'ere and take-a-look at dis," said a slurred voice. "Whit?" A weighty pause and a sharp intake of breath in pain preceded a question. "Dat you?"
"Who else would come all the way out here to save your sorry soul?" Whit called back. "Down in a jiff." He lassoed part of the remaining chain around sturdy looking fixture and began rappelling as fast as he dared. "Oh, and I brought help. Don't kill them. They're our ride off this rock."
A raw chuckle followed by an uncomfortable sounding cough-groan-protest sequence floated up from the depths in response to Whit's words. Alden stepped out of the way as the Shepherd lassoed the chain he was holding and let the other man take the lead. He was paying for this gig after all, seemed only fair.
"Stay up here, brother, watch our backs," Alden said to Jonas, giving the bigger man's shoulder a comradely slap. "I'll be right back," he added with a winsome smile.
Jonas nodded and removed the sword he'd picked up from its sheath. It'd work...and he was kinda growing attached to it...but he wished he could find a gun of some sort with ammo in it.
In his suit, there was a crackle of static as if someone new had come within range of their comms.
Jonas heard the familiar crackle and wrinkled his forehead. Whether they could still hear him down in the pit or not, Jonas had no idea. So he put on a little charade for the newcomer and hoped that if Alden could hear, he'd pick up the hint. "Yeah, just finished up a sweep in this sector. Didn't find much else here than what we've already found. Sounds like another search team is showing up, though. Static and crackle and what-not. I'll hold position and wait for them show up."
A prickle of concern spiked Alden's adrenaline, but even with the flaky comms and the muddied sound down here, he recognised his blood-brother's unofficial code for potential trouble. Reminded him of older times, back when they were mere kids playing merc smugglers. His own voice was faint and dulled out of recognition by the echoes of Ghost's unique nature down here in the proximity of mined ground. "Affirmative, Alpha Team," Alden said. "Search pattern Golf Tango Foxtrot Oscar in progress. Use discretion. Force authorised."
Alden had picked up on their old smuggling days as youngsters. Hot damn! "Copy that, Golf Tango Foxtrot Oscar. Alpha Team on alert." He knew exactly what that code meant...been a while since he'd heard it, but he knew.
At the bottom of the pit, Whit stood in the circular space where the well shaft met a horizontal earthern tunnel leading off to his left and right. And now, he saw what Cooper had seen first. A dark and foreboding ovoid shape was lit by their mutual torches - Cooper and Whit's to either side and Alden's from above as the third man descended to join them. Even as he dropped the last four foot to stand on the earthy ground, Alden swore, Chinese words a harsh whisper in the cool, otherwise empty space.
Before them all, perched silent and still on the worked earthern floor, sat what looked like an opened egg. It was about three foot high, its outer skin apparently made from rubbery 'skin' and the top point was split open in four petal-like shapes to reveal an empty interior.
"Went and called up the devil now, didn't ya," Whit said once he'd come to the ground. He toed the gigantic eggshell. "This what did the town in up above?"
The battered man who Whit had called 'Coop' rubbed a dirty palm over his bald head and exhaled as if he'd been here about five years too long. He didn't look to the Echo's patron as he responded, but leant over the top of the egg to look inside.
"I reck'n it might be," Cooper said, slowly. "Both the dev'l and the Hell. Weren't here when it opened, but been staring at that damn messed up darkness for what feels like forever." As if those few sentences had drawn every ounce of energy from his soul, he shook his head in silence and simply kept staring into that husk.
Alden, meanwhile was confused, worried and definitely unhappily terrified deep down inside. "What we dealing with here?" He asked, hoping one of these two would provide some answers finally. "What exactly we looking at?" He turned in a swift circle on the spot where he stood, eyes bright and seeking as if he expected to get leapt upon any second. "Something come outta there?"
Cooper coughed, spat something that looked bloody onto the floor before him and winced.
"Didn't see nuthin' happen down 'ere," he said. "Was up top, fightin'. Til I wasn't." He looked to Whit, and planted a meaty paw of a hand on the other Shepherd's shoulder. "Don't be touchin' the devil's egg," he warned. "Yer friend might be right."
Whit tried and failed to hold back a grimace. "Well, if there ain't any other survivors, then we'd best bid a tactical and dignified retreat..." His eyes went up the cavern. "... before whatever hatched from that gets a notion to come back this way."
Alden spoke to Jonas on the comm quietly, moving to try and enhance his connection despite the tricky nature of being down in a manmade pit beneath the complex metallic ground here. Fidgeting about the space, his boot connected with the 'egg' and a small puff of - dust? - rose up.
A volatile stream of curse words left Cooper's mouth as the wounded Shepherd spun in circles as if expecting something to leap out of the walls and attack them all. It lasted for a few long seconds before the man grabbed a hold of Whit with both hands at the other's shoulders.
"Fuck dignified," Cooper warned. "We need to leave now. You first, Whit ol' pal." He attempted to shove his ally upwards in the direction of the chain.
"Won't tell me twice," Whit quipped as he started hauling himself up the chain. "Last one up is a dirty sinner."
Saying nothing out loud, Alden kept clear as Cooper and Whit negotiated the upwards exit path via the noisy chain. He wandered just a little way down the tunnel to left and right of that concerning centrepiece, handgun pointing at those dark shadowy corners, damp ground underfoot. There was no scent of blood or death down here, no sign of steps or a trail besides their own bootprints.
As he finally followed the two Shepherds, the Echo's captain took nothing but a couple of images by which to remember this place. The weight of that silence and the death of the colony above them was enough to speed his climb to the surface.
Behind and below them, in the deeper shadows of that lower level darkness, something not meant to be... skittered.
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