GEOVRU: Repticatch

Lesson 1

"Fire at will!" A demanding voice orders the entire deck. "Keep seventy-five percent of the energy cores on weapons and twenty-five on shields!" I controlled the turret as best I could, and pressed all the buttons I was trained to push, cooling the barrels when they would overheat. "Focus on their fighters!" the man added to the list of orders. I locked on to the nearest enemy ship and unleashed as much as I could. "Commander!" I hear from across the massive room. "Our shields have run down, we're wide open to an enemy attack!" I looked back to see the man standing at a control panel clenching his fists. "Convert half the power to the evasive thrusters! The rest of you, continue firing. I looked out into the blackness of space towards the gigantic ship that faced us. The look on it was dark, rugged, and the countless beams of energy that shot past us, created one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen, one that would soon be interrupted and halted to never be gazed upon again.

"Commander, The enemy is reading off high signs of energy!" The same person warned the man in charge, again I looked back to the commander, who was still clenching his fists. "Everyone, abandon ship, they're getting ready to fire their Repticatch!" I sat in awe at just how fast everyone seemed to leap out of their chairs and run away, I froze where I was, wondering why my body didn't want to move. I looked at the enemy ship, across the field of explosions and noises. A massive green light emitted from the hull, enlarging over time, it was too big to dodge, and too powerful to survive, under any circumstance, I was going to die here, alone, in the cockpit of a massive battleship. My legs finally felt like they could move, I took the moment and made a break for the door. A loud ringing began to erupt and my ears felt like they were about to explode. The radio in my right ear was exploding with clatter from all my team-mates, their voices almost drowned out the ringing until a suddenly explosion of sound sent an immense pain through the side of my head and I turned to see what remained of my communicator in shattered pieces on the floor it gleamed for an instant before disintegrating away. I took a right into the corridor towards the hanger and witnessed something I thought was impossible.

The windows on the corridor shattered, inviting the vacuum of space to enter, taking everyone in front of me to a dark demise in the vacuum of the void. I stumbled backwards in an attempt to get away, but I couldn't help but get swept off my feet. I attempted to grab on to anything that would hold me down, boxes, crates of energy crystals, anything. But to no avail I felt my feet leave the warm, air tight space as the bottom half of my body was consumed in darkness. At the last second, my seeking hands found a grip on the edge of the window. I felt the shards of shattered glass. I could feel the worst pain of my life being cut into my hands, the ringing still coursing through my body. I clenched my eyes and held on as tight as I could. The ringing became louder and louder until I couldn't take it anymore. My eyes clenched, my ears felt like they were bleeding and about to blow off the sides of my head, until and explosion could be heard. The force suddenly felt stronger and my fingers flew off just before my ship was obliterated in a radioactive blast.

As the ringing slowly vanished and numbness overwhelmed my body, one thing that my grandfather told me when I was a kid came to mind. I could remember his face leaning over me as I sat in his lap. He closed his eyes and chuckled.

"Never underestimate your opponent." I said aloud with my right index finger proudly pointing to the sky. The brunette next to me stared at me in amazement. It was the first time I legitimately got a look at her. Her hair was just shy of shoulder length and it wasn't styled in any fancy way. The most exciting thing about her was a strange strand of hair that stuck up on the top of her head. She didn't wear anything fancy either, just a black hoodie and a sky blue skirt with a pair of black tennis shoes. She had this look about her that was absolutely filled to the brim with joy and inquisitiveness.