U4: The Space Wanderers

Chapter 8: Entering Planet Shri

The Ultimatum started entering the atmosphere of Planet Shri. Luckily, it wasn't as muggy and thick as Planet Grate's, so the trip down went pretty smoothly. Sighlan turned around to talk to everyone. "Alight guys, just a reminder, when we get out of here, we're going to have to hack through this thick junglish area. Thankfully Fillonor, the town that we need to go to, is not that far away from here. At most it should probably only take us a couple of hours to get there." Xanny was confused. "Uh... if the town is so close, why don't we just fly there?" Sighlan cleared her throat, "We can't, it's against the law to park in town. For some reason they have a no vehicle policy, for as you can see, we're currently in a parking lot smack dab in the middle of the forest. I don't know why they do this, but whatever. Everyone get ready, because we got a lot of slicing and hacking to do!"

As everyone got out and walked to the edge of the thick jungle, they started preparing themselves to go through. Sighlan shot her lazer-pistol to chisel the wall-like shrubbery. Dirken charged electricity through his fingertips to zap heavy vines that covered everything. Goddard and Xanny would use their powered-up fists to punch any dead trees that were in the way. The crew made it halfway through before hearing something odd nearby. "Guys... do you hear any... hissing?" said a scared Goddard.

Everyone was looking around to see if they could see anyone or anything, but all they could see was trees and vines. Xanny backed up a bit, stepping on what seemed to be a patch of mud. He somehow got his foot stuck in it, struggling to get it free. Goddard looked back to see Xanny trying to get loose and started helping him out. Then they noticed that something in the mud looked like a hand that latched onto Xanny's ankle. "We need help, someone's here!" the two of them yelled. Sighlan and Dirken rushed to them and immediately noticed that Xanny was not stuck in any sort of mud.

"Xanny, charge up!" ordered Sighlan. He began to ripple doppler vibrations through his leg, causing the hand to melt off. As Goddard and Xanny fell back, the mud patch had started to morph, and similar looking substances started oozing through the trees. It turns out that they had been followed by some elastian soldiers. "Well well well, look at these sad defenseless morsels. Aren't they quite... delectible?" With a stern face, Sighlan stared them down and readied her lazer-pistol. "Oh, we're far from defenseless... Wanderers, strike!"

The crew then jumped towards the soldiers to fight back. Sighlan rapid-fire shot a ton of soldiers while Dirken let out a massive burst of electricity. A few feet away, Goddard and Xanny started punching and kicking a fair amount of soldiers that kept jumping at them. After a while though, the soldiers just kept coming out of the woodwork, vastly outnumbering them. The elastians began stretching out their limbs in tandem to trap the wanderers. Sighlan began whispering to herself saying, "... Where are they..."

After a few seconds of hopelessness, a person-sized blur zipped through the trees and sliced off the elastian's arms within a split second, freeing the wanderers. Devastated and injured, the soldiers slithered away from the scene. Everyone was relieved but confused, though Sighlan breathed a sigh of relief knowing for sure who it was. "Shrian Heroes, show yourselves! It's us, the Space Wanderers!" Less than a minute later, a young girl had walked out from the woods. "Hey, Si and Dirken!" She had ran up to the two to give them a hug. "Long time no see, squirt! How've you been?" said Dirken. She then noticed the two boys with them.

"Who are those guys?" said the confused girl. "They're Goddard and Xanny, two of our newest members!" Sighlan then directed the boys to the shrian girl. "This here is one of this planet's strongest heroes, Hallah. She, along with her five sisters, protect this world from criminals and monsters." Sighlan then realized something and started looking around. "... Speaking of sisters, where are they?" Hallah looked down and twiddled her fingers. "... They got captured." The news shocked Sighlan and Dirken. "Wait wait wait, your sisters got captured!? How... they should've easily taken care of those soldiers. What happened?"

Hallah sighed a heavy breath and explained her story. "About a month ago, those grimy elastian soldiers took over the planet. At first, we were able to hold them back for everyone to go into hiding, but somehow they developed a special mechanism that caused my sisters to become powerless." Sighlan then raised an eyebrow. "So wait, how did you escape?" Hallah grit her teeth in anguish. "I was the last to be targeted by the machine, but my sisters had pushed me away before it could depower me. They told me to get far away to safety. I wanted to save them, but they told me that they could take care of themselves, they just wanted me to be alright. I'm essentially this planet's last line of defense right now..."

Everyone stood still in a solemn silence for a few minutes. "Sorry you had to deal with that..." said a saddened Goddard. "It's alright, luckily the soldiers aren't that hard to deal with. The only problem is when elites show up once in a while, those are the tricky ones." Xanny perked up as he remembered something. "Hey, we just fought an elite a short while ago back on Grate. Maybe we could help ya just in case something happens while we're still here!" Hallah nodded at the offer. "That'd be nice, I am pretty tired from protecting this place by myself. Oh that reminds me, if you guys are here, then that you're headed towards Fillonor." Everyone pretty much nodded their heads in agreement. "Welp, just follow me then, it's only a few minutes away!

After walking a short while through the woods, the crew made it out into the entrance of Fillonor. It was a humble town, with only a few dozen buildings surrounded by a wall of trees and a small river passing through it. Sighlan looked around at the familiar place. "Wow, this place hasn't changed at all in the past decade, which means that the blacksmith should be a couple blocks down. I'm gonna head over there to get my weapons fixed up, you guys can explore around town if ya want, just don't do anything crazy. We'll meet back up once I'm done over there." And just like that, everyone split off on their own separate ways.