Angel's Authority

Part Four, Chapter Fifty-Five: ZIN Mothership

Based on the Volition Inc.™ game: Saints Row IV™

EVANORA

When I opened my eyes, I instantly regretted it. The gooey, orange substance I was basically swimming in immediately reacted with them and made them burn like someone rubbed peppermint into them.

I almost gasped in pain and was glad that the floor I was standing on slid open and I dropped out of the goo along with it. With a mushy sound, I made contact with the actual floor, squeezing my eyes shut because of the menthol pain the goo had caused me.

I fought myself to my feet but almost fell to the ground again. The entire world was spinning in my head and I couldn't even see anything because of the pain. So, I decided to wait a few minutes before I continued.

"Kinzie?"

I whispered weakly into the open but could have just as well been talking normally; the whisper echoed between the walls of the apparently huge area I was in. I realized only a minute later that I was in the real world now and unless I had an earpiece, I wouldn't be able to talk to anyone remotely.

Eventually, my eyesight returned and I gave out a relieved sigh. I had feared that I would be blinded forever. And I gave out another gasp when I saw the extension of the area I was in, choking on my own spit and breaking out into hysteric coughing.

I found myself only on a small platform within a large tube with spinning pods all over the wall. In front of me was a door and a console beside it and when I looked back, I saw one of these pods hanging on a mechanic arm above me.

It was open and its glass panels were covered in remnants of the orange goo that had dried on the floor underneath it in a large puddle and on my naked body. All these hundreds, maybe thousands of pods contained humans...

But now, I had to save myself first and then, Kinzie and I should be able to work on something to get all the humans to safety. I wondered where in general I was, actually. It looked like the inside of one of those evil spaceships from Star Trek only ten times bigger. No! The shit from Matrix.

Now that I realized that I was naked, I was feeling my body cool down immensely; I assumed that the goo had kept it warm. Therefore, I decided to press on – still feeling a little queasy – and somehow find Kinzie around here.

I wanted to make for the door's console but it opened by itself, once I was two feet away from it. Either it was automatic or Kinzie was monitoring me somehow. Or since this was the only way off the platform, she had already installed some things, what do I know?

"Hey! What are you doing there, human?"

I heard a weird voice say behind me, just as I was getting through the next door. The alien went over to me with his gun in his hands, trying to smack me across the face with the handle of the rifle but with me slowly regaining my strength, I stopped him, took it off him and shot the alien.

This alien rifle was very weird. Much bulkier than ordinary rifles which were already too heavy for me and too much for my taste. But this was the only thing I had now and should more aliens surprise me on the way, I had to defend myself.

Eventually, the automatically opening door – I had also stumbled upon some that didn't open, confirming my theory of Kinzie's meddling – led me to another platform. This one though was hanging in the air, nothingness beneath it. On my way through the halls, I had to incapacitate more aliens but so far, no alarm had been sounded. Well, I hoped that Kinze would come before they found the bodies.

On my way through the halls, I had also thought a lot about this place. It felt like a mixture of base, spaceship and city with all those crates full of rations and weapons, the consoles indicating blueprints of this place and the sight I was offered now on this platform.