Stellar

Chapter 10: The Hive

"WAIT!" Jake yelled.

"What!!" Robert and Livy asked.

"I've been here before! Every time I've blacked out or like zoned out... Livy knows what I'm talking about. But whenever that happens, I see slime and a dark place. This must be that place!" Livy and Robert look at each other in awe and wonder what else could be down here.

"Maybe you're having visions of the way out!" Livy told the boys excitedly.

"There's only one way to find out. Let's keep moving deeper into this cave."

The three cadets walked through the long narrow cave that had a huge ceiling with goo trickling down and almost tapping their heads. They continued to walk, but Robert started to remember designs he saw on a test once about Earth. "Guys, these designs look a lot like a bee hive, do you guys remember that thing on our Earth test back on the ship? We had to choose which home belonged to which animal and, maybe it's just me, but this cave looks a lot more like a bee hive than a cave."

The three of them stopped and looked around for a moment and examined the walls a bit closer. "You're right Robert!" said Jake.

Livy, Jake, and Robert then started looking around to see if there was any type of animal that could be in the cave/hive that could possibly bring harm to them. But there was nothing to be seen.

But in that moment, the three cadets heard an ear splitting RUMMMMMMMMMM. Instead of a buzz, it was more like a long bus-fog horn mixture. Suddenly, a beast with huge talons on its feet, huge wings, beady eyes, and a huge tail with a spike on it swooped down from the roof and picked up Robert by the arms and flew him down the cave at 70MPH. "AAAaaaahh..." His scream faded into the cave as he was flown away.

Both Livy and Jake screamed, "Noooo!" as they sprinted after the beast trying to catch up. But they just couldn't. They just kept running and running down the long cave that seemed to go on in only one direction.

Meanwhile, Robert was screaming for his life but he realized he was on the ground, laying there screaming at the ceiling. "Oh." He said to himself. He looked around and realized that he was in some sort of nest-like structure, covered in goo, held together by bones of creatures and sticks from the outside. As Robert sat in the corner of the nest, he realized that he wasn't alone. He looked up and there it was. The biggest creature known to man that he had ever seen. The creature was huge. 50 stories high at least, with huge paws the size of engines on a Starcruiser (which is huge by the way). The creature, fast asleep, doesn't notice or smell Robert as Robert walked around the beast looking for a way out.

Livy and Jake finally made it to the nest after a good couple minutes of running. "Guys! Look at this!" Robert called and they all rushed over and gazed upon the beast so big they lost all words. "I know right! What do you guys think this thing is?" Robert asked.

Livy and Jake looked at each other and both responded with "I don't know."

"And I don't wanna find out." Jake added. "So maybe we should just, like, leave and never return."

But in that moment, they heard a faint beeping sound coming from somewhere behind the nest. They all scurried to figure out what it was that was making the beeping sound, but no one could find out what it was. They searched and they searched until the beast adjusted its arm and revealed a corpse, a member of what looked to be a crew of some sort of ship many years ago.

"Look! Guys, that corpse has a tablet of some kind and it's beeping!" Livy said.

"Where?" Robert responded.

"Over there! By that green light! Look, see? Don't you see it?" Livy pointed to the green light pulsing.

"Wait, she's right! I see it! I see it!" Jake ran over and picked up the tablet. It read •••...••• , which translated to S.O.S. His eyes widened as he read what the tablet said: S.O.S sending paused 97% He smirked. "GUYS! What if this is our ticket out of here? What if we can unpause this and we're finally free from this planet once and for all?!" Robert exclaimed.

"You're on to something!" Livy added, and so in that moment, the trio unpaused the tablet and started walking towards the exit of the cave. "Guys, I can't believe we are finally going to be able to get out of here!"

The three of them looked at each other with pure joy in their eyes. They began to get closer and closer to the exit until... SCRAAAAAW!

The loudest noise possible that they could have ever heard was roared from the nest .

"What was that?" Jake asked.

"I don't know, but I think we should definitely run as fast as we can."

The three cadets ran as fast as they could through the cave. The cave was crumbling around them as swarms of those things that took Robert swarmed the cave and flew out of the exit. In that moment, as they ran, the tablet, reaching 100%, gave off an enormous beep sound and it causes them to pause for a moment.

"YES! The signal was sent!" Jake yelled.

Livy yelled back, "Keep running!"

"Oh right." He replied. They ran and ran and ran to the exit as they heard a sound almost like a ship going into hyper space.

"Guys, I believe that sound is our ticket out of here!" Robert said as they ran. Livy looked back for a moment and noticed that the giant monster that was sleeping was just behind them, catching up quickly. Suddenly, just In that moment, as they get to the end of the cave, a rope ladder appeared.