Tranquility

Interlopers Part 3

"There isn't much time. I can feel blood soaking through my space suit." Oliver Revetta groaned and held his hand over the fresh wound in his abdomen. His voice was strained. He looked down at his palm and saw the glistening red that pooled in his gloved hand. Black stars filled his vision as the room started to spin. His two Sentinel companions watched him collapse to the floor with horrified looks on their faces.

Only an hour ago, the group had been waiting to escape in their small shuttlecraft huddled on the landing platform of the station. The three-inch armor plating of the vessel was totally exposed to the elements. While their spacecraft's engines were starting, something had punched through the ship's bulkhead and had cut through Oliver's space suit. Oliver could still see the long, silver thing that was sharp enough to cut through the steel of their shuttle and punch through his suit. It wasn't the first time he had been stabbed, but he had decided that it was definitely the most painful. It was fortunate that the three were still wearing their space suits as they stumbled back down into the depths of the facility. The thing they saw on the landing pad had cut off their only escape, and they had been running ever since.

"I can use my bio-energy to staunch the flow of blood... Kanna, hold him down while I heal him." The grim-faced Erik Davis pulled off his grey gloves. Kanna Matsuo kneeled down to help Oliver, who lay flat on his back. Kanna's eyes grew wide as she saw how Oliver's blood was bubbling out of his suit's rupture.

"This won't be good enough Erik, he needs proper medical attention." Kanna said. Her voice trembled like the corridors that were being shaken by the storm outside the station. Erik said nothing. His face was a mask of grim determination. Violent red and orange clouds shifted and churned on the edge of the Great Red Spot of Jupiter. The wind outside howled like a wounded animal. With each shudder from the storm, Oliver shuddered in response. The three interlopers had more to worry about than just the storm, however. The thing that had attacked Oliver was still out there... and it was still hunting them.

"Well, what the hell are you waiting for? Help Him!" Kanna snapped.

Davis held up his hand for silence. Kanna suddenly pulled Oliver to the wall closest to them. The three stood quietly for a long time. Oliver's wavy brown hair was now matted with sweat. The two Sentinels could feel the stress of the station as they both huddled against the wall of the small hallway. They had attempted to get back to the west section of the weather facility. Only a narrow bridge of the derelict facility connected the west section to the east side.

Through the dense layers of space suit, Kanna could feel Oliver's heartbeat fading. She heard a slow, steady, thumping noise on the opposite side of the wall they were pressed against. As the thumps on the other side of the wall grew louder, she could feel Oliver's heartbeats growing fainter. Erik held his breath. Red rusted metal splintered against new, bloodied steel. The door panels on the other side of the wall were being torn like paper. Something was being dragged against the wall on the opposite side. Steel screamed against steel. The three stood in silence for what seemed like an eternity. They waited in wide-eyed silence until the ear-splitting noises stopped. Kanna looked at Davis, and then back at the man she held in her arms. Kanna's hand tightened on Oliver's. Only the sound of the wounded man's shallow breathing filled the dark hallway they were standing in.

"He's passed out." Kanna murmured, her voice trembling.

"Not for long." Davis replied. He laid his hands on his friend's stomach. A soft glow of green energy pulsed from Davis' exposed hands and washed over Oliver's wound. As the younger man's ripped flesh began to knit itself from the bio energy, Oliver's eyes shot open. He screamed. The sound echoed through the dark hallway.