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acts_of_gord... and landed, somewhere other.
"Comes... another...", rumbled a voice that he heard with his brain, and not with his ears; he scarcely noticed....
There was nothing like it in the world, and nothing like it in space as Gordon knew it, either; the roiling purple of the sky stretching off in all directions, the rocks that orbited one another in patterns Newton never classified, the impossible creatures drifting through the sky and blinking in and out of existence. Even the rock under his feet felt wrong, written for another set of rules than the ones that governed everything sane. He crept, half-step by half-step, towards the edge of the rock and peered over. There was nothing below, nothing at all, only the sense of down. If he were to fall here, he would fall forever.
He turned away from that awful void and looked around him. Ahead- if there were any such thing as direction in this place- another island of rock held steady in the boiling skies. A smudge of orange draped one edge: the suited, helmeted body of a Lambda field researcher. Someone who died trying to do what I'm trying to do now, Gordon realized with a bit of a shock. He wasn't the first, and he wasn't the only... he was just the last.
The long-jump module functioned perfectly, he noted with almost clinical surprise as his jump described a perfect arc that planted him precisely on the middle of the hovering island shared by the dead researcher. In the distance he could see a much, much larger asteroid, the only thing of any size within any kind of reach. He'd have to make several more long jumps until he reached the asteroid, but after the insanity that was the Lambda reactor system, he figured he could probably do it. The dead researcher might've been able to manage, but the HEV suit was scorched down one side beyond all recognition.
A hiss of displacement energy rang through the ether. Gordon glanced over at one of the smaller islands and spotted one of the red-eyed slave creatures, drawing itself up for an electrical attack. That explained the scorching, Gordon guessed. Well, he was prepared for that, assuming that his weapons worked the same here-
Hm.
The Magnum did, that was for sure.
He glanced down at the researcher's inert form again. You poor bastard, he thought. All this way to put a stop to the nightmares and what did it get you? Did the others who came with you make it any further, or are they still falling somewhere in the black?
Does anyone remember your name?
Gordon wasn't a religious man- hadn't ever been, even as a kid- but when you ran across the death of someone who could just as easily have been you under different circumstances, it left a mark. He felt like he ought to say something; he'd done it for Paskey, after all, and for the other dying Marine...
Oh, yes. It wasn't much, but it would have to do- and if the Lambda researcher had been anything at all like Gordon, then the sentiment would probably be appreciated. Gordon backed away from the corpse and held his fist briefly to his chest. "By Grabthar's hammer," he said, "by the... sons of Worvan? I think that's it... by the sons of Worvan, you shall be avenged."
He felt a little bit of a fool, but he still felt the better for having said it, so he turned towards the rock with the dead alien on it and readied himself to leap.
"Comes... another...", rumbled a voice that he heard with his brain, and not with his ears; he scarcely noticed....
There was nothing like it in the world, and nothing like it in space as Gordon knew it, either; the roiling purple of the sky stretching off in all directions, the rocks that orbited one another in patterns Newton never classified, the impossible creatures drifting through the sky and blinking in and out of existence. Even the rock under his feet felt wrong, written for another set of rules than the ones that governed everything sane. He crept, half-step by half-step, towards the edge of the rock and peered over. There was nothing below, nothing at all, only the sense of down. If he were to fall here, he would fall forever.
He turned away from that awful void and looked around him. Ahead- if there were any such thing as direction in this place- another island of rock held steady in the boiling skies. A smudge of orange draped one edge: the suited, helmeted body of a Lambda field researcher. Someone who died trying to do what I'm trying to do now, Gordon realized with a bit of a shock. He wasn't the first, and he wasn't the only... he was just the last.
The long-jump module functioned perfectly, he noted with almost clinical surprise as his jump described a perfect arc that planted him precisely on the middle of the hovering island shared by the dead researcher. In the distance he could see a much, much larger asteroid, the only thing of any size within any kind of reach. He'd have to make several more long jumps until he reached the asteroid, but after the insanity that was the Lambda reactor system, he figured he could probably do it. The dead researcher might've been able to manage, but the HEV suit was scorched down one side beyond all recognition.
A hiss of displacement energy rang through the ether. Gordon glanced over at one of the smaller islands and spotted one of the red-eyed slave creatures, drawing itself up for an electrical attack. That explained the scorching, Gordon guessed. Well, he was prepared for that, assuming that his weapons worked the same here-
Hm.
The Magnum did, that was for sure.
He glanced down at the researcher's inert form again. You poor bastard, he thought. All this way to put a stop to the nightmares and what did it get you? Did the others who came with you make it any further, or are they still falling somewhere in the black?
Does anyone remember your name?
Gordon wasn't a religious man- hadn't ever been, even as a kid- but when you ran across the death of someone who could just as easily have been you under different circumstances, it left a mark. He felt like he ought to say something; he'd done it for Paskey, after all, and for the other dying Marine...
Oh, yes. It wasn't much, but it would have to do- and if the Lambda researcher had been anything at all like Gordon, then the sentiment would probably be appreciated. Gordon backed away from the corpse and held his fist briefly to his chest. "By Grabthar's hammer," he said, "by the... sons of Worvan? I think that's it... by the sons of Worvan, you shall be avenged."
He felt a little bit of a fool, but he still felt the better for having said it, so he turned towards the rock with the dead alien on it and readied himself to leap.
