Eight: Season 1

Episode 5: Survivor Count

Jade-
"Done! It's done!" I exclaimed.
"Already!?" Shoto and Hanta asked, shocked.
"Nice Jade." Yo said.
"So, we can head up?" Bakugo asked.
"Nice, you're amazing Jade." Midoriya said.
"Yeah! More survivors to be our tribe!" Tetsu shouted, and they all chuckled.
"Well, I said it's done. I don't know if it works." I said.
"Well...let's go test it." Kiri said.
"It's not that simple. Everything is connected to The Ark. So, if we're gonna test it...we'll have to go to The Ark." I said.
"YEAH!" They all shouted.
"Now hold on. We can't all go, some of us should stay here to keep this place safe. I know we've had limited hostility here...but once the Kuerians see more of us coming...they'll want to know." Shoto said.
"Two of us should go in The Ark and two of us should escort the survivors to Arcadia, make sure they make it there and get taken care of." Hanta said.
"Ok, I will escort the others to Arcadia. Jade, you and—" Shoto began.
"I'll go with her." Kirishima said, quickly.
"Uh...ok? Then, I guess that means you're with me Hanta, escorting everyone back." Shoto began.
"Sweet, if we're gonna go we should go...now." I said, and Shoto nodded.
The four of us headed to The Ark. "Ok...if I just push this—" I began, and the remote turned green.
"Green is good, right?" Hanta asked.
I nodded. "I think so." I said, placing the dish down.
"Ultimate test." Kirishima said, as I nodded.
  I inhaled sharply. "Fingers crossed." I said, as I crossed (🤞🏼) my fingers and exhaled.
I pushed the top button and the dish hovered. We all instinctively backed up. It was making a low humming noise, which meant it was working. "It didn't blow up...that's a start." I said, and I hit the middle button as the dish moved up to the hatch on The Ark and stopped.
"Ok, so far so good." Shoto said.
I pushed the bottom button and the dish hovered down. "Hahaha!!! It worked!!!" I exclaimed.
"I had no doubts." Hanta said, gripping my shoulder and I chuckled.
"Ok, so...we'll communicate with these." I said, handing everyone earbuds.
"Earbuds?" Kirishima asked.
"I rewired them to communicate across large ranges. We could be on opposite ends of the world and still have clear communication. So, this is how we'll talk." I said.
"Cool." Shoto said, putting his in his left ear and I did the same.
Kirishima and Hanta put theirs in their right ear, and everyone at Arcadia put them in too. We did a check in with all 8 of us. I looked at the dish and exhaled as Kirishima and I climbed on. "If things get too dangerous, bail. Save as many people as you can, but do NOT risk losing your lives." Shoto said.
We both nodded. "Keep each other safe." Shoto said, and we all 4 hugged.
I pushed the button to go up and then we stopped at the hatch. "Ok." I said, and I hacked into The Ark's computer.
"Master code successful, welcome back." The Ark said, as the door opened.
"Ok...we're in." I said.
"Good. Get those chambers open and the people out." Shoto said.
I nodded, as Kiri and I walked around. "Hey Shoto, it looks like a few of the chambers are already open." Kiri said.
"That's probably all the politicians, scientists, and royals. They've probably already made their own settlement somewhere on Kueria." Shoto said.
"Got it." Kiri said.
"There are still a lot of unopened chambers." I said.
"No kidding. You wanna go section by section?" Kiri asked.
"Yeah...I have no idea how much weight that dish will hold." I said.
Kiri nodded. "Shoto...it's Section 01 that's cleared completely out." Kiri said.
"Ok, then I was right. That's gonna be all of the politicians, scientists, and royals." Shoto said.
"Yeah." Kiri said.
I walked to the control panel and opened Section 02. "Ok, everyone...I know this is gonna sound like a lot...but you've all been genetically modified to survive on this planet, you're safe here. We have friends that will take you to our settlement waiting below." I said.
They nodded and Bakugo led them to the dish. We lowered down the electromagnetic elevator. "Got them, sending the elevator back up." Shoto said.
The elevator came up, and we did that for each section. "That's all of them." I said.
"Yeah." Kiri said.
"Shoto, go ahead and get them back to the settlement." I said, smiling as Bakugo and I high fived and then...
"Warning, unauthorized access in Hatch 1!" The voice said.
"Shit! No! No!" I shouted.
"Talk to me Jade!" Shoto exclaimed.
"Somehow they figured out we got on board and were helping the people out. The entire Ark is in lockdown mode...Kirishima and I are stuck on here until I can override the lockdown." I said.
"Do you need us to—" Shoto began.
"No, those survivors are more important. We'll figure out a way back down, just get them to Arcadia." I said.
"Ok, stay safe you two." Shoto said.
"Well that's just great, what now?" Kiri asked.
"I'm working on it." I said, hacking into the control system.
Kiri sighed, folding his arms over his chest. "You can make yourself useful you know." I said.
"How? I don't do tech stuff. I fight and break things." Kiri said.
"Find the files from Dr. Mort's experiments. I have a feeling we're not the only ones he tortured and experimented on." I said.
"Snooping, I can do that." Kiri said, pointing at me with a finger gun.
I chuckled and smiled as I continued to try and work on the lockdown. "Any luck?" Shoto asked.
"No, it's like every time I break a firewall, another one pops up, it's almost like someone is blocking me and the only way to do that..." I began.
"Is if someone is on the ship, you two need to get out of there...now." Hanta said.
"I'm trying." I said.
"Jade, hacking the lockdown won't work if you're in a hack war with their tech person. They'll just keep putting up firewall after firewall, and you'll never get in." Hanta said.
I sighed in frustration. "Yeah, I know." I said, seeing the firewall message again.
I walked and found Kiri. "Jade...look." Kiri said, and I looked at the screen in the lab as it played.
On the video, I was screaming as Dr. Mort experimented on me. I saw the ones of Shoto, Hanta, Kiri, Bakugo, Yo, Tetsu, and Midoriya too. I also saw ones of other survivors that we helped down to the ground.
I pulled a USB drive out and downloaded the videos onto it. "Look away." I said, and Kiri turned away.
I took off my shirt and my bra and then used my knife to cut open my breast and stitch the USB drive into my right breast...just in case. "Ok." I said, and he turned back to me.
"You should see this too." Kiri said, and we left the lab.
We walked down the way. "Restricted area?" I asked, and Kiri nodded.
The doors suddenly opened. "Did you do that?" Kiri asked.
"No!" I said.
"HALT!" A man shouted.
"Go!" Kiri exclaimed, and he pulled me inside as the doors closed behind us.
"Are these..." I began.
"More pods, a whole prison worth. These are all criminals." Kiri said, showing me their files.
"We need to get out of here!" I shouted, and I ran to the control pad.
I started frantically typing, and then the firewall message kept happening. The PA system came on. "I never thought we'd see you again, but you freed all of my other little toys and now I have no one left." Dr. Mort said.
"Kirishima?" I asked.
"I don't know." Kiri said, as we both backed up, holding hands.
"You're trying to escape the prison ward right? Well, I'll give you an impossible choice. You and your friend can leave, but you have to kill all of them." Dr. Mort said.
The lights flashed red and it all shut down. The chambers opened up and I gasped. "No! No, no, no, no, no!" I shouted.
"These are still people you sick bastard!" Kiri yelled.
They slowly began to emerge from the pods, laughing and lurching towards us slowly. "Fresh meat fellas." A man said.
"What say we teach them a lesson." Another said.
I grabbed the remote for the satellite dish. "Do you trust me?" I asked.
"Yeah." Kiri said.
"I need you to buy me 5 minutes." I said, and Kiri nodded.
I began to rewire the remote and pulled off the battery pack. "Give me your earbud." I said, and he handed it to me.
I put both in. "Plug your ears Kiri." I said, and he did.
I pressed the button and a high pitched h frequency went out that sent them all onto the ground holding their ears. I ran to the control panel, grabbing two masks, and leaked knock out gas into the chamber. I gave Kiri the other mask and then I used the master code to open the door. We both took off the masks.
"That was badass, but holy shit you cut it close." Kiri said, as we ran.
"Thanks, the only problem is now we can't talk to Shoto and them." I said, as we ran, and then we were surrounded by men with AK-47s.
We both put our hands up. "Oh crap." I said, and they knocked us out.