The amphitheater was cold and quiet as a corpse, despite the dozens of pale-faced crew members that filled it. There were fifty people in attendance, all manning different computers that controlled the functions of this ship. Their uniforms were color-coded to show what team they were a part of. Blue techies stared up in horror at the hologram that had appeared in the amphitheater, but the red weapons team had their eyes glued on their individual screens, sweating profusely as they no doubt tried to think of ways to combat this new threat. The purple life-support members all looked to him though, their captain, Henry Stoll, who stood just beneath the giant red hologram in the center of the amphitheater.
Henry took a shaky breath as craned his head to look up at the enemy ship. A Dragon-Class frigate had been sent after them… He ran a hand through his dark hair, white-winged at the temples as he tried to plan their escape. The Sparrow was a good ship, one of Terna's best, in fact… but there was no winning this fight. The only option was to flee, and yet, even if they did do a Far-Jump to escape, the Dragon would simply pull them right out of warp with its Talon beams. Escape didn't seem a viable option either.
A head on battle would prove impossible as well, even with the Sparrow's superior maneuverability. The hologram displayed here did not accurately depict what was drifting toward them. There were only five Dragon-Class ships in the Final Kind's navy, and each one was roughly the size of a moon. There were thousands upon thousands of weapons mounted on the scaled hull, each one capable of turning the Sparrow to slag. The aliens didn't refer to it as a Dragon of course, they called it Zephala or some such… but Dragon was a far more fitting title. It was massive, the dark hull looking like a scaly hide, the thrusters looking almost like a thick spiked tail, but what really tied it all together was the planet-scorching plasma cannon affixed to the front.
It looked like it had been set in a wide open maw, ready to breathe flame on any ship that dared to oppose it. Henry did not think that the Dragon would use its plasma-scorcher on their little Bird-Class cruiser, not when they had smaller tools that could get the job done easily enough. A strange sense of pride filled him, knowing that they had become such a problem that the aliens would send such a behemoth after this little frigate.
Henry turned to address his crew, adjusting the color to his white twin-tailed captain's coat before clasping his hands behind his back, "Look at this!" He yelled, his voice modulator enhancing the volume of his words, "They had to send a Dragon after a Sparrow. Now what does that tell you?" He asked, gesturing to the crowd, "They're scared of us. We've been turning their ships to slag for over six months now since we lost Earth. That is how good we are… however, I have to say that this is a fight we cannot win. I will not lie to you about that." Henry said, his face hardening, "I'm sure that everyone present already understands that. We cannot escape, and we don't stand a chance in hell in a straight up fight. No matter how you look at it, this is the end of the road, but as I see it, we have a unique opportunity to deprive the Final Kind of one of it's most powerful assets." Henry grinned, "Before Earth was taken, The Sparrow had been equipped with a rather unique weapon, an Anti-Matter bomb. As you know, we were going to use it to wipe out one of their Core Worlds, but that ship has sailed. Now however, we can still complete the testing. We are all going to die no matter what we do, so how about we take The Dragon with us?" He asked, letting the question hang in the air for a moment.
Henry feared that his men would reject the idea, or even worse, fall into a terrified panic… but the crewmen, bless them, all cheered their agreement, raising their fists toward the horrifying hologram. It was almost enough to bring a tear to his eye, if only Lord Jyn were still around to see that humanity had not given in to despair in his absence.
When the cheering died down, Henry cleared his throat and began explaining his plan, "A Long-Jump is impossible, The Dragon's Talons will rip us right out of the jump and put us right where it wants us. However, with a Short-Jump, we'll be able to put ourselves right up next to it. That is when we'll detonate the bomb, let's initiate the jump now."
"Aye aye sir!" A blue-crewman shouted, "Initiating short jump!"
That would be about thirty minutes, extraordinarily fast for a battle in space. Still though, the Dragon may begin firing at them during this waiting period, they'd need to survive for at least that long to make it-
"Sir!" Another techie shouted, "Fifty bogeys inbound!"
They were sending smaller ships then? Very well, this could be easier to deal with than the Dragon's weaponry. Henry looked back up to the hologram, his eyes widening in shock as it shifted from depicting The Dragon to the approaching alien vessels. To his surprise, only Mosquitos seemed to be inbound, the broad bodies and long pointed tube at the end quickly closing the distance. Boarding ships… they wanted to take the ship intact? No… perhaps they knew about the bomb!?
Could they be trying to take that and reverse-engineer it? How would they have found out? The intel could have leaked with the taking of Earth, if the aliens got their hands on this weapon it would make them far more dangerous than they already were. Henry would not allow this to happen, these boarding crews needed to be dealt with. They could gun down at least half of those Mosquito's before impact, but the other half would reach the Sparrow for sure. They would need to pull out all the stops to buy time.
"Weapons teams, try and take out as many of those boarding craft as possible before they reach us." He ordered, turning to his second in command, a young woman wearing a white coat similar to his own. She stood right next to the intercom, her finger already hovering over the button, awaiting his command. "Ensign, alert the Eighth Arm and tell them that Mosquitoes are inbound, we need them ready… and tell cryo to wake him up."
"Aye aye sir." The Ensign replied, pressing the button.
"All Eighth Arm personnel, Final Kind Mosquitoes inbound! Prepare for combat immediately!" She yelled, "Cryo station, unfreeze Hoplite Thirty-Seven!"
Hoplite's frosted eyes opened immediately as he felt his casket rise from the ground. It was time to fight again. Already he could feel the nano-freeze leaving his pores like sweat, it was a painful sensation; like having shattered glass poking out from every inch of his body. He ignored the agony as his casket opened, showing no visible reaction to the familiar pain. Hoplite emerged into the cryo station, scanning it for potential hostiles. It seemed that the space was empty, save for the two standard humans standing before him.
Notably, all the other frosted glass caskets were empty of any occupants, meaning that The Sparrow was likely working with a full crew. The coffin-shaped cryo tubes stretched wall to wall down this long narrow chamber, a thousand of them in total. His golden eyes then shifted to the two cryo-team humans, a man and a woman, wearing light blue jumpsuits. They both stared at him wide-eyed, craning their heads upward to look at him.
The man, far larger than average, only just barely was eye-level with Hoplite's abdominals, while the woman only came up to his hips.
As the nano-freeze continued to seep out of his pores, he ordered, "Explain the situation."
The two snapped to attention immediately, "Final Kind boarding craft inbound sir!" The woman shouted.
Hoplite didn't waste any more time speaking with them, quickly turning on his heel and walking quickly out of the cryo-chamber, completely naked as he went. He would have ran, but the cool-blue nano-freeze made his movements stiff. Even with this horribly 'slow' pace, he was capable of outpacing a standard human in a sprint. Klaxons blared as he maneuvered through the gun-metal grey halls of The Sparrow, bee-lining straight for the armory. Crew members scrambling through the halls all stopped to stare at him with awe as he passed, apparently forgetting the situation they were in.
He paid the stares no mind, it was nothing he wasn't used to already. It wasn't long before he reached the armory, the large chamber bustling with activity. White lights illuminated rows upon rows of metal weapon lockers, filled with standard ballistic weaponry. Each one had a soldier in front of it, the door wide opened as the soldiers of the Eighth Arm donned their gear. He took in everything in a single instant as he proceeded through the armory.
Hoplite saw exo-troops off to the left of the lockers, combat engineers working quickly to equip them for the fight ahead. The weapons they wielded were massive, larger than some men, chain-guns attached beneath each arm. The exo-suits they wore let them use such massive weaponry, but they were cumbersome, making those soldiers akin to a mobile weapons platform.
Aside from them, black armored men clad in tungsteel alloy loaded ballistic weapons and threw on their helmets, cursing with every sentence as they went. Clouds of cigarette smoke wafted through the air above them as they prepared for battle, making up most of the people around the lockers. A holdover from an old-Earth military branch, the marines were Terna's most common infantry, but fulfilled dozens of roles. Versatile and proficient, if a tad unprofessional when there was no fighting to be done, as could be seen with this vehement smoking.
The few conductors among them didn't seem interested in stopping this, merely ordering their Choirs to arm themselves faster. Tall and imposing, the conductors never seemed to be without their gear, even out of combat. Their long dark coats hung over their own black tungsteel plate, the glowing red eyes of their skull-shaped masks seeming to take in everything at a glance. These troops were outfitted with a Logitek coprocessor, much like himself, slowing time from their perspective and allowing them to order their Choirs efficiently in combat. They could make a squad of four unorganized troops as efficient as a hundred, given the right circumstances.
Especially if divers were included in their Choir. Compared to the much larger soldiers around them, the short, thin women making up the majority of divers looked almost out of place, wearing only the most lightweight of gear to protect themselves. Attached to their backs, hips and calves were dozens of thrusters that would allow them to become airborne, equipped with short precision rifles that could punch clean through a Yugoro skull with ease. It was too bad that Hoplite himself could not utilize the jets divers had… he was far too heavy, even out of armor. Most standard human men couldn't use the jets in fact, meaning that the majority of divers had to be women.
All four of these types of soldiers complimented one another and made up for glaring weaknesses each had. The Sparrow was in good hands with this many soldiers onboard. It was time for him to go gear up as well. The Sparrow had been outfitted with an armory specifically for him before Earth fell, the Phalanx suit lay within. Everyone seemed to freeze as Hoplite passed them by, cigarettes falling out of mouths and even the conductors took a pause in barking their orders to stare at him.
When Hoplite reached the end of the armory, a tall thick metal door stood before him. He placed his eye against the retinal scanner, and after a second, the door opened.
"Welcome, Hoplite Thirty-Seven." A digital voice greeted him.
He ignored the voice and passed into his personal armory, hearing loud cheering behind him before the door sealed. A large tungsteel assembly ring stood before him, the various pieces of the Phalanx suit arranged on stout steel tables surrounding it. He stepped into the assembly ring, and grabbed it, placing his feet on it as well before it rose from the ground. Dextrous mechanical limbs surrounding the assembler went to work, attaching the various pieces of armor to Hoplite's body. It only took a single minute before it was done, and he stepped out of the auto-assembler fully clad in the Phalanx suit.
He moved over to the mirror to inspect it, ensuring that nothing had gone wrong in the assembly process. The heavy dark suit seemed to drink in the surrounding light, the red trim outlining individual sections of his armor sticking out in the darkness. The knee-plates, unlike the rest of the suit, were a solid red, seeming to almost glow compared to the rest of the dark Adium plates.
His featureless helmet was smooth, with no visor whatsoever. Despite that, he was still able to see with the aid of dozens of small cameras set into the Phalanx suit. They allowed him to see the world outside the suit, granting him three-hundred and sixty degree vision. Nothing could sneak up on him with it, even if they were cloaked. A series of small pads sat right next to his chin, each one acting as a button to enable different functionalities. Infrared, night vision, the works. Two pairs of heavy-duty flashlights were also installed, on the front and back of his helmet. They were almost unnecessary, what with his motion tracker and the option for both thermal and night vision already installed. Yet, with a bump of his chin he could enable 'seizure' mode, setting the two lights to flash rapidly. It was useful for throwing off the aim of his enemies, though he could only ever use it if he was alone. It wouldn't be optimal to throw off the aim of his allies as well, after all.
The Phalanx suit was remarkably sleek, at least, compared to outdated models he'd worn in the past. He had heard soldiers calling this new version the 'Fridge Suit'. It was certainly broad and almost blocky, but to his eyes it was smooth. Still, he could understand the comparison, this armor was built to take as much damage as possible, so it had been given the sturdiest construction possible. This durability was greatly amplified with a kinetic shield that would deflect projectiles and even absorb explosions. Even without the shield, the thick Adium plates would be capable of defending him against practically anything. To this day, nothing had managed to pierce or melt the plating... fridge suit indeed.
Satisfied with the quick check, Hoplite immediately moved toward the massive weapon locker, quickly flinging it open before equipping his weapons of war. Each weapon within had been specially crafted for a super-soldier's oversized hands, most normal guns proving to be too small for a Hoplite to utilize in the field effectively. It wasn't that Hoplite couldn't use standard Eighth Arm equipment, it usually just meant that he would have to tear off the trigger guard first. The weapons within his locker had been sized for extra-large personnel and had been crafted to still be compatible with standard munitions.
Hoplite wasted no time in swiping up his silvery ballistic pistol, magnetizing it, and a few extra magazines to his thigh. The power of the Fortis magnum was capable of punching right through kinetic shields and most types of Final Kind battle-plate with ease.
Hoplite then grabbed his rifle, sleek, black, and semi-automatic with an auto-tracking dot sight. It may not have been as powerful as the magnum, but its accuracy was second to none. To this day, Hoplite has never missed his mark with the Visus rifle.
He attached the Visus to his back plate before he grabbed the last gun from the locker, keeping it clutched in his grip. A long-barreled black shotgun, its shells powerful enough to punch a hole through any alien that dared stand before it. It was a heavy thing and could double as a sturdy bludgeon, a perfect tool for close combat. There were no sights attached, it was unnecessary, whatever you fired at would turn to mist even with a glancing hit. This one was large enough that it looked like it should be an attachment for an exo-suit, but with the size of Hoplite's hands and his greater strength, he could wield it as easily as a twig. The Magnus shotgun was his personal favorite instrument of destruction, capable of clearing entire rooms with a single shot.
He kept the Magnus in hand, taking the final item from the locker and tying it around his waist. A heavy-duty combat belt, equipped with ammo-filled tac pouches and a sheath for an arm-sized tungsteel combat knife. The Sectis knife would be necessary in close quarters, nothing could split flesh and metal quite like it. Once Hoplite was fully armed and ready, he emerged from the chamber, the Magnus in hand.
The armory had emptied out considerably it seemed, with only a few soldiers left struggling to don their gear. The Sparrow shook almost as soon as the door slid shut behind him, and he readied himself, aiming his shotgun at the surrounding walls of the Sparrow, keeping his eyes peeled for the first breach.
"The Mosquitos hit! They're drilling in, wherever you are, get ready!" The ensign shouted over the intercom, "Keep them busy for as long as you can until we can jump!"
Jump? So they were running again… Earth may have been conquered, but surely there were other colonies out there still that they could go defend? Had humanity really lost? He began jogging toward the hallway, a group of marines trying to follow behind him. Through his back cameras, he could see the soldiers huffing and puffing as Hoplite left them utterly in the dust. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate having help, it was just that Hoplite could not afford to slow down.
It didn't take long before he found the first Mosquito tube, passing into a wide hallway and spotting his first victims. Little armored creatures with elephant-like gray skin and huge bug-like eyes stared at him with terror, rat-like teeth chittering in an unintelligible babble. They didn't even come up to a normal human's knees, but Hoplite knew that these creatures were more dangerous than they seemed. The little golden-glowing plasma rifles the creatures wielded could melt through a man at minimum charge. There were around twenty of them, groups moving apart from one another to begin combing the halls for victims. Hoplite had become familiar with every combat race that was a part of the Final Kind's military, and he had killed more of this species than any other. They were often called Pugs by the troops, likely due to the shape of their faces, but the true name of their race was Lomi.
The go-to cannon fodder of the Final Kind, Pugs bred like rabbits and were too dumb to question their places but smart enough to fire a gun. Their armor was uniform, the same shade of red splashed haphazardly against hard plastic armor. Pugs were always meant to die - absorbing shots meant for the more useful members of the Final Kind's military, so they gave them completely ineffective armor. It may have almost been better to let Pugs just go naked, for the hard plastic armor they wore was bulky and hard for them to move in.
Hoplite had always theorized that Pugs were only equipped with ineffective armor so that they would feel safer than they were. After all, it was better to have your cannon fodder feel like they'd be safe when doing a suicide charge. The Pugs trained their guns on him, the coiled rifles charging up to max power. The plasma rifles, like all Final Kind weapons, were as sleek as they were deadly, the barrel looking like a steel honeycomb. Hoplite could see down the barrels to the tiny golden plasma reactors within, knowing that even a single max-charge shot would be capable of melting through standard-issue marine plate. He had once put a bullet right down the center of the barrel and hit that reactor with devastating results. The resulting explosion usually matched that of a standard-issue frag grenade, but Hoplite wouldn't be doing any trick shots unless he had ample opportunity.
Hoplite fired the Magnus, the powerful shells splattering gray blood and entrails all across the hall. The slugs that didn't directly hit the Pugs ricocheted down the hall, denting the metal and flying through alien bodies left and right. A few shots bounced off his energy shield, draining it only by a fraction before they recharged. After that single shot, only three Pugs remained out of the twenty that had infested the hall, the trio of survivors screeching as they turned tail to flee down another hallway.
They were immediately gunned down before they could turn the corner, automatic rifles turning them to gray chunks of fleshy goo and sending sharp chunks of plastic flying. Hoplite darted down to the center of the hallway, hopping over bodies and pointing his gun down the Mosquito tube. The black interior of the tube was only lit by a series of dark red light strips, and Hoplite could see that it had been emptied of all occupants.
He immediately turned, running down the hall and rounding the corner where the Pugs had been reduced to gray chunks of viscera. The marine squad at the opposite end of the hall nearly opened fire on Hoplite as he sprinted toward them. Thankfully they held their fire once they realized what he was, not that the rounds would have had a chance of getting through his shield. They moved to greet him, but Hoplite rushed right past them, intent on finding more aliens to butcher before command put him back in cryo.
And oh he did find them. More Pugs than he could count got blasted away by his shotgun or had their skulls caved in with firm kicks. Eventually, he found the other aliens he knew would be on the ship, the larger, more deadly variants. He engaged in a gunfight with a tentacled Swaglay, the eldritch creature blasting him with rays of superheated plasma from the many tendril-mounted guns it held. It had a broad torso hidden beneath the many moving tendrils, its four insect-like legs skittering around to avoid gunfire. The armor it wore could stop small caliber rounds easily, but larger guns could punch through the scaled alloy like it was paper. He ended it quickly enough with a well-placed shot from the Visus rifle, punching through its octopi-like skull and sending the Pugs around it fleeing in terror.
He shot them all dead before he began maneuvering through Mosquito-pierced hallways, slaying Final Kind with the efficiency of a machine. Eventually, he came upon the vehicle bay, where hundreds of soldiers and aliens battled. Hoplite sniped more Swaglay and Pugs with the Visus rifle before turning his attention to the fliers. The large vehicle bay proved to be an ample combat theater for what the marines merely called Wasps. They were man-sized insectoid creatures with strong exoskeletons and two pairs of arms and legs… their racial name was Jaro, but Hoplite preferred to call them 'Wasps' as well. The buzzing of their massive translucent wings terrified the troops, but to Hoplite it was merely a nuisance.
At some point, he found himself next to a mounted turret, set up no doubt by the freshly melted corpse next to it. Hoplite took to the turret and began gunning down the Wasps, punching through their black-striped yellow exoskeletons and sending them crashing to the ground dead, bright green blood mixing in with the variety of colors now staining the floor. Every bullet Hoplite fired managed to find a home within a Wasp's wretched body, punching through mandibled skulls or splitting open large abdomens with brutal efficiency. After the turret ran out, he ripped it free of its mount and threw it at a group of Pugs that had pinned a marine down with gunfire. The man had been trying to make himself as small as possible behind a little metal crate, one that was half his size.
The hot plasma had reduced the crate to molten slag within seconds, if Hoplite had been any slower then the next volley would have burnt that marine to a crisp. The detached turret crushed one of the Pugs, the sound of crunching plastic and a gurgling throat no doubt reaching its comrade's ears. Seeing that one of their own had been turned to mush, they scattered, running headlong into other Pugs or into crossfire before being reduced to little more than peppered steak. The marine hiding behind the melted crate then saw Hoplite standing far above him on the platform overlooking the vehicle bay, flashing Hoplite a thumbs up before he began unloading his rifle into the enemy lines. Hoplite then leaped from the platform, landing on top of a U-93 heavy ballistic tank and drawing his shotgun.
There were still more aliens to kill-
"Jump is a go!" The ensign shouted.
That didn't matter, the aliens were on the ship and they would still be here after the jump. He and the marines continued fighting to reclaim the vehicle bay from the invaders, pushing the Final Kind ever backward as the Eighth arm built momentum. Hoplite never noticed when the ship finished the light jump, nor even when it started. Right as they were mopping up the last of the aliens, the captain's voice came over the intercom.
"It's been an honor serving with you all. We're taking out this Dragon-class here and now with the anti-matter bomb we've been carrying. Hopefully, that'll put a big enough dent in the Final Kind that they leave our remaining colonies alone. Good work everyone, see you on the other side."
Hoplite froze in place then. Dragon-class? Anti-matter bomb…? Was he going to… he was going to die? A strange cold sensation welled up within him, something he hadn't felt since his first days as a Hoplite recruit… all the way back when he was just a child.
Fear.
That fear left him paralyzed for long enough that he didn't react to the armored jeep being chucked at his head by an ape-like Yugoro. The corded strength of its four arms sending the vehicle speeding towards his head like a freight train. If Hoplite had braced for the attack, it certainly would have hurt, but he would still be in the fight.
But he was not braced.
It collided with his helmet and snapped his head back, sending him crashing into unconsciousness.
It was dark, that was the first thing that came to mind as consciousness returned. Were his cameras disabled? Hoplite bumped his chin, seeing the display come up. Just darkness, the cameras themselves were functional. He felt up and down his body and came to realize that he was floating. Zero G's, but he wasn't out in space, there would be stars if he was. This pure blackness meant two things; he was still in the vehicle bay, and the power had gone out. That would mean that life support and the gravity generator had also gone out…
It was likely that all the crew was dead by now, including the Final Kind invaders. His suit could keep him alive for up to twelve hours without oxygen… so how much time had passed? He bumped his chin again, seeing the time display on his hud. He had gotten out of cryo… roughly eleven and a half hours ago. He had around thirty minutes to get to an oxygen-rich environment or he'd suffocate.
He activated the built-in flashlights installed on the front and back of his helmet, revealing that yes, he was still on board the Sparrow in the vehicle bay. Bodies of both man and alien surrounded Hoplite, bumping into each other on occasion before passing through floating liquid pools of multi-colored blood.
Hoplite activated the thrusters in his boots and back-plate, and floated up to the exit and out of the vehicle bay, moving through dozens of floating corpses as he went. He drifted through the empty and dark halls of the Sparrow, passing over the bodies left behind. He didn't stop to try and identify any of them, there was no point and a quick scan with his thermals confirmed what he already knew. Everything in the ship was cold and dead. He needed to get to an escape pod.
Those would have their own power and life support system. He could use that to renew his oxygen supply and get off this ship if need be. Hoplite knew where the pods were… but he found himself growing anxious as he found several of them missing. Likely either Final Kind or fellow humans got to them and escaped after the bomb… speaking of which… Did it work?
Captain Stol had come on the intercom to say that he was going to suicide bomb a Dragon-class cruiser with an anti-matter bomb. Hoplite didn't know too much about them, but he did know that they were extremely experimental and that the Sparrow had been outfitted with one for testing. A test that had never come to be after the Final Kind took Earth. Likely by now, the aliens were finished subjugating humanity to follow their draconian laws.
It seemed as if the bomb's effect was more like that of an EMP, rather than a so-called anti-matter bomb. After all, the ship was still here and the power was out, what else could that mean? His thoughts were cut off after he finally found a pod. The very last one at the end of the hall was pill-shaped and empty of any passengers.
He floated inside and activated the life support system, shutting the sliding doors behind him. He waited there for an hour, just floating as his oxygen tank refilled itself. The phalanx suit could detect when he was in a non-breathable environment and sealed itself off accordingly, but when his environment had air, it would open its filters and suck the air into a hyper-compressed oxygen tank.
After that tank was refilled, he shut off the life support and reopened the doors, his filters immediately sealing. He floated through the corridors until he finally came upon the bridge. The amphitheater was completely empty of bodies. They might have made it to the escape shuttles along with captain Stol, but where would they escape to? There had to be somewhere they intended to land the pods. Either that or they had found another human ship and chose to escape to it, though that was unlikely.
The ship was blacked out, with no hope of using the holodeck for anything. He could always just use the engineer ladders to take a peek outside. There should be one around the shuttle bay he just left, engineers constantly had to use those ladders to keep from floating away. It wasn't like they would float off if they let go, they always carried cables with them to stay safe when performing maintenance.
Hoplite wouldn't bother with safety cables, his boosters would let him get back to the ship even if he somehow lost his grip. He didn't have to search long for the access hatch that would lead him outside. It was encircled by a bright yellow line and read 'engineer access'. He keyed the button next to the hatch but got no response. Right, power was out across the Sparrow, he'd need to be more physical here.
He slipped his fingers in the groove between the sliding doors and magnetized his boots to the ground. Hoplite strained, gritting his teeth as he forced the thick doors apart with his and the suit's enhanced strength. He only got it as far open as his arm span before he stepped through, the doors slamming shut behind him. They made no noise as they did so.
The airlock was small, with only a single closed manhole in the center of the room. Considering the fact that the power was out, he would have to pry this one open as well. That proved to be no large feat, the previous door had been a challenge, but this would be as easy as peeling an orange. Soon he was scrambling down the maintenance shaft, kicking open the second hatch at the bottom, and climbing the ladder out into space.
He climbed quickly, only briefly observing the surrounding stars before ascending. He could see half of a green moon far off to his left… that must have meant that there was a planet nearby right? Soon, he had his answer after he reached the top of the Sparrow. He peered over the top of the ladder to see a gigantic eyeball staring back at him, floating in the black void of space. The iris matched the many bloodshot veins stretching toward the center, all a deep shade of oceanic blue. Hoplite saw that parts of this entity's eyeball were a deep infected green, with patches of red and yellow on the upper half of the thing. The lower halves seemed to be rotting the worst it seemed, with a blighted deep purple shade on the left, and dead reddish-brown on the right.
The eyelids were both different shades as well, the top being a fiery red and the bottom an icy white, the lashes matching both. The sclera was the same shade of blue as the veins and iris, with the pupil being yet an even deeper shade of cobalt. Hoplite stared at the monstrosity, which stared back at him, not blinking. It seemed to fill the entirety of space for that instant, imposing and horrifically massive. His hands dented the gray metal ladder, his grip stronger for the terror flooding him. Hoplite's heart beat loudly in his ears, a cacophonous rhythm that threatened to drown out all thoughts. He waited for it to blink, waited for it to do something, but nothing ever came. After his fearful awe subsided, Hoplite eventually realized that this eyeball… was a planet.
How could that be? How could the geology of this world have come to be shaped in such a way? What were the odds of this being pure chance? Was this some kind of Final Kind art world? He had never known them to be artistic in anything but subjugation and genocide. Hoplite shook his head, there was no way that this was a Final Kind world, if it was, he would have seen countless cruisers and defense platforms in the atmosphere, but aside from that… there was nothing.
Nothing except the dark husk of the Dragon-class cruiser. It drifted lifelessly, no lights shining from its sleek scaled bulk. It dwarfed the Sparrow a thousand-fold, being nearly the size of the green moon nearby. So the bomb had worked… it had to have had the effect of an EMP then… but… if it had just been an EMP, then why was the Dragon missing its back end? From the way the ship was angled, he could see that the back half of the Dragon had been sheared clean off. As it tilted, Hoplite could make the honeycomb-like structure within the Dragon, matching the interiors of other Final Kind spacecraft.
There were questions he had; very many questions that he needed answers to. Hoplite had a feeling that those answers would be down there on that cosmic eyeball. Light illuminated the left half of the planet, though with the tilt, it would be getting dark soon on that side. If he were to launch as soon as possible, then he would likely land on that left half. Did the surviving crew jettison down there after all? Before all the air evacuated from the life support system?
They must have, but if they evacuated to that world…
That meant that the Final Kind likely evacuated what personnel they could as well. Somewhere down on that eye world, the Eighth Arm fought against the forces of the Final Kind… without Hoplite. He would be joining them soon, they just had to hold out a little longer.
For the next three hours, he gathered up weapons, rations, and other equipment into the shuttle, as much as it would be able to carry. Hoplite had no idea what the situation would be like down there, but he wouldn't be caught unprepared. Unfortunately for Hoplite, all of the vehicle-sized escape pods had jettisoned, meaning he would not be able to take a vehicle with him. That at least meant that there were vehicles that had made it planetside, that would give the Eighth Arm better chances against Final Kind forces.
He packed all the scavenged gear he found into the eight seats on either side of the pod, making sure to pack as much extra ammo as he possibly could. Hoplite climbed into the pilot's seat, and started the pod once more. The door slid shut behind him and he punched it, pushing the lever forward and feeling the shuttle launch out of the dead Sparrow. Hoplite had to angle the shuttle down toward the planet just right, he didn't want to crash in the middle of the ocean after all.
He aimed for the greenest part of the planet and activated the thrusters. It would be a while before the pod actually reached the planet's atmosphere, considering that he was launching from right next to the moon. These shuttles were fast, but they couldn't go light speed. He guessed it would be an hour or two before it actually reached the eye. Light barely touched that portion in the western hemisphere, so by time he landed, Hoplite estimated that it would indeed be nighttime as he had predicted earlier. That wouldn't matter much to him, the only thing that made him uncomfortable was the time it would take to make it to the surface. Hoplite knew that worrying about the time of his landing wouldn't get him there any faster…
So he waited, seeing the massive world-eye drawing closer and closer until finally…