sooner or later god'll cut you down
Who: Group 2.
Where: The dregs of the ship.
When: ~all weekend.
Warnings: Swearing, violence, general creepiness, references to loads of death of loved ones, Stephen King-esque monsters, etc.
Notes: This will be the catch-all log post for the group of characters going to the bridge. Sure we could assume, but what's the fun of unspeakable horrors ( Read more... )
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John remains where he is for a drawn-out moment, unable to get the image of his wife out of his head, only reacting when the speculation of 'they' is voiced - he turns, about to ask who the fuck Dick means.
Shit.
"It's got to be him distorting what's here normally. Everyone else must be keeping him too busy elsewhere to remove us."
So Capa's right. There has to be a key. Maybe it was just in a damn box on the wall originally, maybe all they'd have to have done was break the emergency glass. Now they've got a phalanx of super-mobile unearthly rats. John yanks the last flare he's got off his belt and lights it, the phosphorus shower making the mass of tiny bodies flinch back as one unit, even as they keep pouring in.
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He took a deep breath. "There's nothing else in here. It has to be there." He indicated the hallway the rats were coming from and took a step forward. "Somewhere."
They started multiplying faster, as if spurred on by his words.
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He quickly handed the phaser off to Capa, grabbing one of his escrima sticks off his back. Not that it would necessarily do a heck of a lot of good against a swarm of rats - had he said Dean Koontz novel? Now it was like that scene in Temple of Doom. Or Last Crusade if we were really being picky about our Indy films - but he could use it to knock them away if they decided to start climbing up his body or something.
"Take it, my suit'll keep me pretty insulated from the bites, I can try and wade in and see if out there."
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"Sanity?" Rhetorical question. Apparently if they waited for that, they'd just. Die here. Of old age. Or rats.
He figures his jacket and gloves are as good a bet as he's got, and with the flare in hand, John starts trying to break the things up and look in the swarm for anything key-like.
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"There!" He pointed, but it was already gone. The flash of metal that he saw overwhelmed by scurrying feet and bare tails. "I saw it. I swear!"
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He turned when Capa said he'd seen it, but it was already gone. At least they knew it was here.
"You know, I've seen a lot of weird henchmen in my day, but who hires a swarm of rats to keep a key away from people?"
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"Bilge rats?" Even now, he sounds pretty deadpan. It's not really a funny theme - maybe they should be grateful that porcupines or rattlesnakes aren't commonly associated with ship bowels instead. In his peripheral vision, John can see words appearing on the walls, darker and bigger, but he refuses to look. There's a dial tone from the phone now, too, growing louder.
He makes a grab for something, a flash of metal, but just ends up with a non-key-holding rat, which he promptly discards. They start piling up at his feet, and he jams the flare at them, sending the little things squealing away.
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"FUCK!" he yelled out, frustrated, kicking a group of rats against the wall. Almost there and he got nothing but rat nibbles for his trouble. At least he had dropped it closer to the trio, rather than away from them.
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"Capa, try that again! John, use the flare to get them over to Capa, I'll try to grab it!" He was gambling on having the best reaction time, so he could snag the key before the rats reconfigured themselves, and run the least risk of getting shot by the phaser by accident.
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Something squeals and then goes sickly silent under John's boot - fucking great - but he goes with the haphazard plan and herds the rats towards Capa, kicking them if they don't cooperate. He doesn't dare use a gun in close quarters like this, with metal walls - phasers and flares it is. There's a clear sense of menace emanating from them now, as if they're starting to get pissed that these stupid humans are getting their act together; they're still crawling in by the dozen from outside.
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"Okay, okay. Ready?" he called to Dick, giving him a quick look before returning to the rats. "I'll stop on three. One...two...three." He abruptly stopped firing, actually pointing the phaser away from where he anticipated his hand to be.
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God, this was awful. The Barge really wanted him to develop a rat phobia.
"Got it!"
He quickly pried it away, tossing the rat aside, trying to shake the suddenly more violent and aggressive rats off before running to the door, shoving the key in the lock and twisting. Something clicked. "Door's open, come on!"
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Their triumph seems to piss off the defenses even more, the off the hook phone beginning to inform them in a shrill voice that the operator is very, very displeased, and the rats shuddering and swarming as if possessed by one collective mind - but fuck that. John lunges towards the door (shoving Capa in that direction if necessary, hi, let's get the fuck out of here.).
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They had to get out, they had to get out, they had to get out...Capa repeated that in his mind.
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As soon as they were clear, he raced in after them, slamming the door shut behind them. Hopefully the rats weren't smart enough to try breaking it down.
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