Encounter with an infestation

The lesson with Graham ended far too quickly for Matthew's taste, he wanted a chance to avoid the others for the day. Luckily when he came back he discovered his wish was granted by them, as they had gone on an errand for Strong.

“They went to one of the Helium mines, it had a little trouble with some local creature,” the lieutenant informed him as soon as he arrived at the warehouse.

“Huh, curious. Well, if they wish to waste their time doing things of that nature I won’t complain,” Matthew said, intending to head back to the dorms and to his room. He had enough of this day already.

“You know, you really should just tell them. They’re good kids, and so are you, Matthew. They’ll accept you either way. You are not your parents and their actions aren’t yours,” Strong continued nonchalantly, almost as if he wasn’t even listening.

“I already told you, lieutenant, I won’t. My family’s… disgrace is neither their business nor of any relevance to my relationship with them. Now please, I would like to stop talking about this. My memories of you need no further tainting,” Matthew was furious now, even despite their history, or mayhaps because of it, Strong had crossed a line at this point, and the ice mage turned to leave.

“That’s exactly why you should tell them. If you keep denying it happened you will never accept your new place in life,” Strong put a hand on Matthew’s shoulder.

“I doubt that would help it,” Matthew shrugged him off and kept moving towards the door.

“Well, just think about it!” the lieutenant shouted after him.

“Fine,” Matthew huffed quietly, not sure if he would truly follow through.

The room beyond the door was strangely empty, Ember noticed that immediately as she stepped through. It wasn't barren, with desks, computers and screens filling the entire room and covering every wall, but it was empty. Empty of people, and of any sign of the enemy but that same strange liquid all over everything. Just the same as the hallway. The floor, however, was remarkably different, it was as if the same liquid on the walls and objects had hardened into a sort of chitin and covered any sign of the stone below.

Seeing that there was nothing to find in the control room, Ember headed forwards. The hallway on the other side of the room would lead her up a flight of stairs and to the hangar above, and that was her goal. More than finding out what had happened here, the enemy’s presence needed to be determined.

However, even after leaving the bridge, all she found was silence. Silence in every hallway, and that same blood. That was until she reached the stairs, where she once again heard the chattering of something moving upstairs, and that with the silence became far more concerning. Deciding to look upstairs for only a moment, she went up the first few steps quickly.

That’s when she saw a shadow moving at the top of the staircase, but when she moved quietly to get there it was gone. Even with her invisibility, that thing could sense her, she was sure of that.

Continuing to move, she noticed the hallways of the top floor were just as empty as before. But as she got closer to the hangar that noise turned louder and louder, and she knew exactly where it came from.

'They're targeting the Gundam for some reason? But they’re simple creatures…’ she pondered to herself, unsure how that was possible. Nonetheless, she decided to turn back, better to come in there with **** if that’s where they all were.

John and the group waited patiently, but they didn’t have to sit there for long before Ember returned. She told them exactly what she saw, there was nothing behind the door or on the entire floor, and even the next one was seemingly empty. Though her warning about the thing that hid from her made John worry slightly.

"I heard them concentrated in the hangar, they may have gone after the Gundam for some reason…" Ember concluded, trailing off as her voice turned less flat.

"That's gonna make this a lot harder, but at least we know what to expect. Thank you Ember," John responded, glad for her information and to see her back.

"We need to get up there then, make sure they're restricted to that room while we plan how to attack it," Yan said confidently after John stopped talking, holding herself far less nervously than everyone but Bass.

"You know Yan, I'm behind you on this one," Bass winked to her, "after you?" she signaled to Yan then the others.

Everyone but Charlotte nodded in response, and with Yan walking in the front they began heading towards the second floor. They got there quickly and with no interruptions; the second floor had remained empty. John did notice the strange chitin on the floor, and curious as to its purpose decided to observe it.

He should have done that far earlier, he knew that now. This blood and chitin were dangerous. It was stupid of him not to consider that possibility before. Every inch of the mine was turning into a ticking time bomb, and the source of it all was the hangar. He needed to move quickly, whatever was powering this transformation needed to be burned or destroyed, and the quicker the better. Not sure how to tell the team, John grabbed Bass' shoulder and whispered in her ear.

"You know the liquid?" he started, as quietly as he could.

"What about it?" Bass said, almost annoyed.

"It's turning this place into one giant birthing grounds for those spiders. We need to destroy wherever it's spreading from," he continued.

"The fuck? Are you serious?" when she saw the look on his face she knew he was, "guess fricking creep is real, boss," she laughed a moment later.

"Spiders are the new zergs, apparently," John laughed as well, surprised as ever at her levity.

"That's enough planning, let's get in there, boss," Bass stated. They were standing outside the hangar's airlock, just where Ember was before. Even beyond the door, John could hear the incredibly loud chittering and the window of the door was utterly covered in the liquid, allowing no visibility inside. On their way there, John saw nothing, but given the pop-up, it didn't surprise him. Power was being sipped from a generator in or around the Gundam to facilitate this conversion, and it wasn't surprising that every spider rushed to it.

Luckily, they had already formulated the group's plan and it was now time to put it into action. Ember was first to move, hiding under the cover of her ability and opening the door in a single swift motion. Bass was ready next, her two halos already vibrating powerfully between her hands she hit them with one another. A huge shockwave passed through the giant space of the hangar beyond the door, as John and the rest plugged their ears to protect from the noise. It still shook John to the core, but it didn't shake him further. Liquid and chitin inside the room flew off the floor and walls and the revealed horde of spiders covering every surface of the room were similarly moved. Some even exploded into huge amounts of blood which continued to cover everything.

That’s when John saw his own target, the Gundam. Even in the large two floored room, it was enormous, barely not scraping the ceiling. It looked much like the picture he had been provided, but its color had faded and drained somewhat. He wasn’t sure if that was because of wear or the blood which had been on it. A few moments later, while he was running into the room, the Gamer noticed what he needed to get into it, the ladder hidden just behind it. Spiders rushed back into the front of the room as he sprinted to it, having to dodge and weave between them. The closer he got the more clearly he saw how old the Gundam truly was. Bits of rust were all over the coat of green and black paint.

Just as he reached a leap away from the ladder he heard something jump behind him. John panicked as he felt the spider crawling to find exposed skin, and the feeling of a bite spread across his neck.

Damage taken: 10 HP lost.

Poison applied, health will reduce by 0.3 per second

There was no time to react to the popups, John found the spider with his hands and grabbed it with all his ****. Only barely removing it from the grasp around his own neck. Immediately he shot a bolt into one of the horrible creature's eyes. It was a mass of black fur and legs dotted with 20 or so blue eyes. Worried about its dead body, the Gamer threw it away, and it exploded into blood the moment it hid the ground.

Recovering quickly, he kept going, jumping from the higher level of the hangar's floor to the ladder leading to the sunk in mecha. His legs planted on the first step of the also rusty ladder, he found cover from the mayhem in the room. Ember, Bass and Yan were all trying to carve through the hordes of spiders which continuously tried to leap onto them. John knew he had to hurry, the Gundam held what they needed in their hand, a sort of large flamethrower that had been hastily attached to one of its hands.

Step after step he got higher and higher, eventually reaching the small door that led into the cockpit. It was marked with red paint and danger was written over it. As Ember had informed him, piloting a Gundam was quite a complicated endeavor, but Psychic mages were particularly apt at it, for a widely unknown reason. In this world, they were called Newtypes.

The cockpit itself was a mess of levers, buttons and screens. It was obviously designed for function over simplicity and form. A simple green button was clearly marked as start and John pressed it immediately. Screen after screen lit up and showed him the surrounding hangar, as well as targeting reticles locked on to both his group and the thousands of spiders.

Below each of the buttons had appeared a label in the air. John was unsure if it was from his powers or the mecha itself until he noticed a pop-up in the edge of his field of vision.

Psychic link has been applied to the Gundam "3M2D". Basic flight knowledge and interaction obtained.

'So a combination of both, convenient…' John thought to himself for a second before finding the two triggers used to move the Gundam. He grabbed them immediately, jerking them forwards with some ****. With a crashing noise the mecha's legs moved upwards and onto the hangar's main floor. Barely missing Yan on his left side, hundreds of spiders had already died. That's when he noticed something quite strange, a cable emerging from that foot. It was made of the same chitin as was on parts of the floor and pulled him back as he tried to move further. Engulfing a port of sorts on the leg, the Gamer could guess what it was for.

'Fuck, that must mean they're pulling the electricity straight from the Gundam itself. I need to get rid of it right now,' his options were limited, only armed with a drill on the right hand and a flamethrower on his left.

Each trigger activated one of the tools, John knew that, but it would be difficult to use them with his friends directly in the way. But Bass had thought of that, and a signal was created to serve that exact purpose. Absolutely focused on them appearing outside of the cockpit, John summoned a round of Arcane Bolts. There was a second of pause before he did anything else until he saw Yan's gaze go up to the sky amid the swarm of spiders. Bass and the others were nowhere to be seen, and he couldn't hear anything from the outside. Nonetheless, they lodged themselves into the spiders next to Yan, John hoped that would be clear enough.

The shapeshifter rushed back towards the entrance, and besides her appeared the other three. Even from his position John could see they were all injured, but they were all still alive, and the spiders had left them alone. Charlotte immediately began healing the others. What he didn't notice was who the focus had shifted too. Looking back down he saw the mecha slowly being covered by a sea of black fur.

'Fuck, I guess they're going after me. Hopefully the flamethrower works on them still,' the hand moved with his, and with a pull of the trigger the nozzle of the flamethrower spewed fire all over the room. It spread like water across the various spiders, one after the next. Meanwhile, John lowered the other hand towards the cable, hoping to use the drill to cut it. But the moment he tried it was too clogged to spin. Hundreds of spiders jumped into the drill bit burning alive just to stop the cable from being cut.

'Another hive mind? Or is this something else?' John wondered, but there was no time to discern that clearly. He stopped the drill's spin and tried to get as many as he could off, his other hand still spewing red flames into the room.

Eventually, enough had died that he managed to spin it again, and the cable was cut cleanly. At that point, almost no spiders were left, and the room was a charred mess. That's when John looked at his health and saw how low he really was. Rushing back out of the cockpit he tried to get back to the door as soon as possible. The poison in his system was a minute away from killing him as he felt the effects of it on his body. Sluggishness and nausea overwhelmed him, struggling to make every step down the ladder safely. At the end of it was a familiar face, and one he desperately needed, Charlotte.