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Chapter 11

Kyle, Terra, Williams, and Doctor Levin had progressed through multiple corridors and jeffrey tubes until they came to the deck they needed to be on, deck thirty-six. The stations reactors were only a few hundred meters ahead of them, once they exited the jeffrey tubes that was. Terra made sure to check through the small viewport that was on the hatch and saw that the coast was clear, and nodded back to the rest of the group. They opened the hatch and crawled out into the hallway, Kyle's heavy work boots making a rather heavy sounded thud as he came out. Terra pulled out a small pistol she had taken from a dead Security Officer and took aim, looking further down both ways and took a deep breath and exhaled it, relieved that there were no signs of any infected nearby. "We need to make this fast, Jack will be-" Terra said when suddenly the station shook violently and they were almost knocked off their feet. "Before that happens, Williams, tracker?" She asked.

Williams nodded and checked the motion tracker they had taken off the same dead Security Officer several decks above and he sighed as he shook his head, "Nothing at all Terra." He responded.

"Alright, let's move then." She said. They began to run towards the reactor room when an unholy sound of monstrous noises could be heard. They all gasped and Terra crouched as the vents above them began to shake with movement. She could hear the damn things slithering around inside them, crawling inside them using their nails and claws to pull themselves along. "Doctor Levin?" She asked, in a hushed tone.

Doctor Levin, his eyes filled with fear, stared back at her, "What?!" He hissed back.

"Thoughts on what they're doing? Mean, if the job was done, and if the hive mind is really destroyed by those missiles, shouldn't they be popping out and trying to run down the easiest path?" she asked.

Doctor Levin stared back up at the shaking vents and shook his head, "To be quite honest, we didn't fully know what would happen if the Hive mind was destroyed. That was more of an educated guess. But right now, I'd say those THINGS are making their way to defend the hivemind. I mean, if the hivemind were destroyed then yes, they'd be taking the easier path to get to it to try and repair what was destroyed. So, I'm guessing our dear friend Jack managed to piss the hivemind off." He said.

Terra cursed under her breath and nodded, "Alright, then we don't have much time. Let's go!" They continued running down the hallway until they came across a large blast door with a keypad on the wall to the left of the door. Doctor Levin ran up to it and pulled a card out of his pants and slid it through the reader on the keypad and punched in a code. The keypad flashed green and the door opened. Inside, they could see an array of walkways that criss-crossed paths and sections where monitors and screens were flashing, the massive reactor at the center changing colors, from red to purple, purple to green, green to yellow, on a blue color that glowed intensely almost illuminating the entire area. The reactor was in a cylindrical container that went through five decks, and Kyle's jaw dropped as he watched it pulse. It let out a low hum and vibrated the deck beneath their paws and feet.

"My gods...." Kyle muttered as he stepped forward.

"I knew that the reactor was big, but damn." Terra said. "Doctor Levin d-" She turned to face him, but he was gone. They were all transfixed on it, that they didn't notice he had vanished. "Son of a bitch!" She said, rather loudly. "Williams, Kyle, you know where Doctor Levin ran off to?" She asked.They both shook their heads, and she sighed then motioned for them to follow. "Shit, little rat ran off. Let's get going to the control room. See what we can do to set this thing off." They made their way through the huge reactor room, Kyle glancing at the consoles that sat in pads that extended away from the cat walk's themselves, until they came to a large elevator that would bring them up to the control room. They all stepped on, and the elevator lurched upward and brought them quickly to the control room. Once there, Kyle felt sickened at what he saw. Bodies were strewn among the control room, almost all of them missing body parts, and some with their intestines pulled out and apparently chewed on, all Human. Kyle turned away and vomited at the site while Terra and William slowly made their way through the mess of corpses, trying not to do the same. Eventually Terra came upon a large console which glowed red, and she placed her paw on the keypad that was there. No Hard Light Holo Pad but it worked. She began to type away, trying to locate the routine that would set the reactor to overload, but couldn't make out anything on the screen. Damn that Levin, he was the only one capable of activating the sequence needed, and he had vanished. She slammed her fist against the console and suddenly, several machines came to life, they all swiveled around and began generating a holographic Fox that was dressed in an old Earth Military Uniform, appeared to be a Soviet Russian Uniform if Terra recalled correctly, a General.

"My name is Demitri Sokolov, Artificial Intelligence of the UGSM Aura Station. Please state your name, position, and title." The Fox said, his whole body giving off a red glow with flowing black fur and golden eyes piercing through all of them.

"Doctor Terra Brooks, Aura Station main Hospital. We-" Terra started, but the AI cut her off.

"Doctor Brooks, you do not have authorization to be within this area, please leave immediately before I contact security and have them remove you." Demitri said.

Terra growled quietly, "There is no security!" She shouted at him. "Do a Bio check of the whole damn station! Look at all security feeds! We have an infestation and we need to blow this reactor and the station up!"

Demitri stared at her for several moments, flickering as he went through all the available data. "Strange, I was not informed that these events have taken place......more curious, where is Doctor Henry Levin?" He asked Terra

"That rat bastard vanished once we got in here, why?" Terra said.

Demitir huffed and looked around the room, "I was shortly deactivated by his command codes, now I see why. If I was active and saw this outbreak, I would've immediately caused a reactor breach destroying this place. Doctor Brooks, I will begin the sequence now. You have fifteen minutes to get off the station. Run." He said to her.

Terra nodded and turned to face Williams, "Run like hell." She said, and they both did, Williams grabbing Kyle as they reached the elevator then pushing him out as a shrill alarm sounded and the AI's voice boomed over the speakers.

"All personnel," The AI said, "Reactor breach in fifteen minutes, please evacuate the station."

The metal beneath the three shook violently, almost knocking them off their feet. They made it towards the door when Kyle screamed in terror. Terra looked behind her and couldn't believe what she saw, Michael had hold of Kyle, his decomposing body, his jaws wide open ready to bite down on Kyle's throat. "Terra! Help!" Screamed Kyle.

Terra reacted, quickly drawing the pistol up and firing it at Michael's head. The plasma bolt went straight through, but there was no entrance wound, no exit wound. It had no effect. Terra's heart pounded, her mind raced. He wasn't really there, and yet he had a thorough grasp on Kyle, meaning that it was within Kyle's head yet somehow there's meaning that if Michael bit down on Kyle's throat, he would die because his mind actually thought he was bitten in the throat. "Kyle! Calm down damn it! Michael is not real! It's your mind!" She shouted at Kyle.

Kyle continued fighting, tears streaming down his cheeks, "Terra, he's real! I can feel his muscles tightening around me, his breath, gods it smells! Help!" He screamed back at her.

Terra grew frantic, when Williams ran at Kyle, and grabbed a hold of him. Williams began to pull Kyle away when Michael bit down onto Williams arm, and tore flesh from it. Williams let out a loud, agonizing scream as blood spurted out of his forearm, and drenched the fur with blood. "Gods damn you Michael!" Williams screamed as he, somehow, grabbed a hold of Michael himself, and separated Kyle from him, then jumped on top of the bastard and held him down. "Just die!" He shouted at the top of his lungs as he began to bash Michaels' face in. Michael howled in anger as his skull gave way to the pounding, and eventually silenced.

Kyle, tears still streaming down his cheeks, ran and hugged Terra tightly. "Oh Gods Terra." He said, whimpering. Terra was breathing heavily, still frightened at what had happened there, and saw that the blood that drenched Williams' forearm was now gone, and the chunk of meat that was taken out was still there. She gently petted the back of Kyle's head, trying to get him to calm down, when she heard the footsteps. They came from behind both of them, and she turned to see a massive white furred Wolf, at least seven feet tall, extremely large muscles, wearing a torn up trench coat and thick work boots that had been torn apart with the size increase, and saw it bring it's fists down. She grabbed hold of Kyle and quickly dodged out of there.

"William!" She screamed, but it was too late. The beast had seen him and had left Terra and Kyle and gone after Williams. Williams backed away from the thing, his eyes wide with terror as it reached out and grabbed him by his face. He let out a muffled scream as he got lifted above the ground, his feet kicking against the things chest, claws digging into the flesh of it. It didn't flinch, not one bit. Terra could hear the sound of it squeezing his skull, and watched as Williams attempts to fight back grew more frantic as he even tried gauging the things eyes out, and still no luck. There was a terrifying muffled scream and tears streamed down Williams cheeks as a sickening crunch could be heard, and Williams body went limp. His right eye had popped out of its socket, dangling against the things massive fists. A mass of blood, muscle, bone, and brain matter dropped to the ground. The thing released Williams head and his body crumpled to the ground, his face, or what was left of it, almost unrecognizable as a pool of blood formed around the body which involuntarily twitches from the final neurons firing, trying to receive any messages from the brain that was no longer there. "Wiiillliiiaaaam!" She screamed out in horror as she got herself and Kyle up. They both stared at the massive creature, it's gouged out eyes regenerating, and staring right at them. Terra let go of Kyle, and bolted for the control panel and slammed her paw against a big red button, and the doors slammed shut before the thing could to them. "Oh Gods." She said, falling to her knees as the thing slammed it's fists against the door leaving dents. "William.....no...." She could feel tears going down her cheeks, could feel her whole body shaking from the shock of losing him.

Kyle looked over at Terra, tears still filling his eyes, and he got up walking towards Terra, then got on his knees and hugged her tightly. "Terra...." He said to her, his voice breaking up. "I'm so sorry....If I had better control of myself....Gods, I'm sorry Terra." They sat there for several minutes, listening to the thing pound away at the door, until Kyle stood up and helped Terra stand, and sniffed. "We need to go. We don't have long and we need to get Jack and the Argus to get out of here." He said. The station rumbled as the slamming stopped.

Terra nodded, "Yeah....come on." She said weakly as she held onto to Kyle's paw and they both started to run back down the hallway, hoping that Jack and the Argus were ok, and that they could escape.

....................

The Infected were right on top of the Argus, slamming against it, alarms blared all over his readout. Jack growled in frustration as he activated several small turrets on the Argus that popped up and began shooting them off, but there were just too many. He looked at several of the outside cameras and saw that the bodies were just beginning to pile up on the hull, and he saw more dropping on top of them, tearing them apart to get to the hull. He screamed in frustration then, suddenly, the whole station shook violently and a communications connected to the Argus, and a russian accented Fox wearing a Russian General's uniform appeared on his display. "Attention all personnel, reactor breach in fifteen minutes, please evacuate immediately."

He took a deep breath, and let it out as the station shook once more, and then realized that some of the infected were being shaken off the Argus. He grinned as he ignited the engines and began his ascent, swerving the Argus back and forth. The mass of bodies began to slide off and the new Infected that landed on top of the ship couldn't get a good hold and fell off as well. He could see the ceiling that he had blown through coming closer and closer, and then angled the Argus to go straight through it. There was the horrendous sound of metal scraping against metal, and of bodies being torn apart and clattering against the hull. Within a matter of minutes he was out and hovering over the area of the station he had blown through, and saw the bodies drifting off the Argus. He tapped his communications, "Jack to Terra, come in!" He said. No response. "Jack to Kyle, come in!" He said, and still no response. "Damn it guys!" He yelled, "Respond!"

After a few seconds there was a burst of static, and he heard Kyle's voice over the comm's. "Kyle here, Jack, babe, it's good to hear you. We're heading towards Landing Pad One, meet us there!" Kyle said, and Jack grinned ear to ear and punched it. Within the next few minutes he arrived at Landing Pad One and saw that the doors were opening and brought the Argus in to land. Once down, he saw Kyle and Terra running towards the Argus with dozens of Infected chasing them. He unbuckled and ran to the hatch to open it, then yelled "Get your ass' in here! We are leaving!" The two of them bolted into the Argus and he sealed the hatch behind them as the Infected began to reach the Argus and slamming, clawing, and pounding against the Hull. "Strap in!" He shouted over the rising noise of claws against metal and ran back to the cockpit and strapped himself in and began to ascend once more. That was when he heard it, the heavy boots slam on top of the Argus, and snarled as the exterior cameras showed the grey bastard once again on top of the Argus, and saw that he was using his weight as well as dozens of Infected that it had picked up, to bring the Argus back down. He cursed under his breath as he unstrapped and made his way to a hatch that lead on top of the Argus. Kyle began to question him but Jack ignored him as he climbed up, holding his pistol in one hand, out onto the top of the Argus were the grey bastard stood there, staring at him. "Ok asshole," He said as he aimed the pistol, "Get the fuck off my ship!" And fired. The thing stood there and took hit after hit, barely budging from his spot. Jack snarled and kept firing until the pistol overheated and he dropped it back into the hatch. "Alright, you want to stay on?" He asked as he stepped over the hatch, "Then enjoy the ride!" He slid back down the hatch, sealing it and running back to the cockpit of the Argus and took the controls, and began to spin the Argus upside down and watched the exterior cameras as the bastard continued to hold on. Jack cursed again as he did several maneuvers and watched as the thing finally fell off the Argus, and back onto the deck.

"Go to hell." He said as he angled the Argus' thrusters towards the thing, and ignited them incinerating the nightmarish abomination. As they launched upwards towards the Pad's doors, he saw multiple chain explosions rippling through the station. "Hey, AI, thought you said we had fifteen minutes!" He shouted at the AI that had remained on his display.

"Unfortunately, Admiral Whitcomb has sped up the process by authorization codes. You now have one minute to evacuate." Replied the Fox, who seemed to smirk at Jack and then vanished.

"Bastards." Jack muttered as they cleared the pad. Outside were burning infernos that were quickly extinguished by the vacuum of space. Multiple support pillars and sectors of the station began to come crashing down around them as Jack accelerated towards the entrance of the station, and saw that it was closed. He growled as he turned all weapons online and fired towards the entrance. Streaks of orange and red plasma arced outwards and striked against the entrance followed by a barrage of torpedoes. Once the smoke had vanished he saw that there was now an opening, just barely big enough for the Argus. He punched it, hoping that it really was big enough for the old girl to squeeze through. He took several deep breaths as the Argus slammed into the hole and tore it open, and came through with a trail of explosive fire behind the Argus. There was cheering from Terra and Kyle as they accelerated away from the exploding station, towards Admiral Whitcomb's fleet. Jack checked the read outs around him and smiled, minor hull damage. However he did notice an issue, a Mass Lock had been initiated against his ship. The Mass Lock would literally lock up his FTL systems until he got clear of it, and he saw multiple fighters inbound to their location as well as saw multiple Flak turrets turning to fire on them. He growled as he spun the Argus into different maneuvers, avoiding a majority of the Flak turrets, and taking the brunt of the fighter's attack. Alarms sounded and Jack knew that he had to get clear of this fleet if they were to escape. Question was, to where? If they left and went to the nearest system, Admiral Whitcomb would follow and destroy them. Earth was definitely out of the question, but possibly Leben. He had done a few things for one of the governors on Leben and knew he could possibly call upon them to protect himself, Kyle, and Terra. The Argus shook violently as it took hit after hit, he maneuvered around the fleet, and eventually decided on Leben. Within the next few minutes, he was able to get clear of the Mass Lock, and Jump to Leben.