Chapter 8

Rather than flying in Titan our heroes had to fly a ship to the moon, piloted by Lance. It didn't quite handle like a Galalunan ship, but it was close enough for him to be familiar with its capabilities.

"It should be about a few hours before we reach the moon," Lance told Octus and Ilana. "Make sure you have your armor set to spacewalk. We'll probably need it out here." As Lance was speaking, the group saw 3 meteorites streaking towards them. On their present course, they didn't have to move out of the way, but they knew it would be risky to just let them land on Earth.

"Those are just like the meteorite that carried the Mutradi that attacked me!" Ilana exclaimed.

"I am detecting unfamiliar, but distinctly Mutradi energy signatures inside the meteorites," Octus added. "The moonbase from which they are being launched most likely encases them inside chambers of moon rocks to protect them during re-entry. But that alone would not allow them to survive the vacuum of space."

"We should kill them now so that we won't have to deal with them later," Lance said. "Both of you, get out there and try to destroy the meteorites. The creatures inside will die if you just make a hole in the rocks. You guys go after 2 of them, I'll take one with the ship's weapons. All it has are basic laser cannons, but it should be enough." Ilana turned on her armor, and she and Octus immediately went into a room separate from Lance's. After the door had closed behind them, they opened a door panel that opened up into space. The suction from its vacuum forced them out, but once they were out there they managed to stabilize themselves and started to shoot at the meteorites. They were all about the size of Titan, but nowhere near as durable. Each Titan member worked on separate meteorites, managing to deteriorate them as they were hurtling towards Earth. Lance managed to destroy his first, but when he did he got quite a surprise.

The Mutradi inside seemed to be completely unaffected, simply swimming in space. It appeared to be a large orange-furred gorilla-like creature with tusks and four oversized hands, the latter two being where its feet should be, similar to that of various Earth primates. The ape Mutradi punched the ship, damaging its shields. Lance found that his cannons were too weak, so he was forced to avoid the monster as it swam through space after him.

"Octus, how is that thing able to survive space?!" Lance asked through his armor. "Mutradi can't do that!"

"There appears to be an oxygen bubble around their bodies that seem to protect them as they move. I didn't pick these up until after yours broke out of its encasement," Octus explained.

"I think we should stop attacking the other two," Ilana decided. "They could all of have these things, and that would make things much tougher for us."

"But if we don't, then they'll land on Earth and wreak havoc!" Lance pointed out. "Maybe they could go after my Dad! I'll try and get the ship out somewhere safe, and then we'll form Titan!" But the ape-monster suddenly slammed his fist on the ship, making a huge dent. Ilana and Octus tried to zap and blast the ape monster, but their attacks did little to distract it from pummeling the ship.

"The thrusters are disabled! I can't move the ship!" Lance told Ilana and Octus. "Hold on, guys, I have an idea!" Ilana and Octus watched as the ape monster kept pounding at the ship with all of its fists for a few more seconds. From inside the ship, Lance turned on his armor and withdrew a grenade. He then used Manus' sword to make a hole in the ship. Seeing this, the ape tried to grab him, but Lance quickly turned off his armor, reverting to his spacewalk form. This allowed him to quickly dive out of the way of the ape's hand, leaving it to unwittingly pick up the grenade instead. Lance quickly left the ship the same way Ilana and Octus had done as the grenade exploded in the ape's hand. Lance quickly turned on his armor again and joined up with Ilana and Octus.

"Oh, thank goodness! I thought something had happened in there!" Ilana exclaimed upon seeing him.

"I had to distract him with a grenade. We're gonna need Titan to take this thing out." And so the group formed Titan as the ape withdrew its hand to face them.

"What's up with his hand?" Lance wondered, looking at the hand where the grenade had exploded in. It appeared to be swollen and limp, as well as charred from the explosion.

"During the explosion, all parts of the oxygen overshield of the monster that were caught in the blast radius dissipated momentarily," Octus explained. "Explosive attacks could damage or even rupture the oxygen overshields around the Mutradi, exposing them partially or completely to the vacuum of space."

"Let's use something that causes explosions, then! Initiating Cosmic Bow!" Ilana commanded Titan, and the aforementioned weapon appeared.

"Let's use the Neuron missiles, too!" Lance added. Titan's shoulder changed to expose the missiles. The ape roared in challenge, the circulation having returned to its bad hand. It swung a fist at Titan, but it was hit with an arrow. Just like before, the explosion of the arrow upon impact caused the hand to lose circulation for a moment, stunning the ape. When Titan tried to fire a third arrow at its chest, however, it caught on to the game and dodged it. The ape then delivered a punch to Titan, knocking out the bow from the force of the blow. The ape then reached for it and tried to break it, but Titan gave it a kick and grabbed its bow back. It fired another arrow, this one landing on the ape's shoulder. The ape tried to punch Titan again, but the robot dodged and shot another arrow into its side. The ape lunged for Titan, but it backed away out of its reach with its jets and fired more arrows from a distance. The ape was pelted all over with arrows, but the explosions seemed to do it little physical harm. But as the ape tried to attack Titan again, its eyelids fluttered, and arms moved more slowly.

"Its oxygen overshield is depleting! One more attack!" Octus told them. Titan fired one last arrow at the ape's chest. The explosion did little damage as usual, but the ape suddenly passed out in space, and its body began to swell.

"The vacuum of space will kill it within minutes," Octus said. "Let's move on to the next monsters." As if to answer him, the other two monsters emerged. One was a biped, brown, and eyeless creature with four tentacles tipped with claws. The other was a giant scorpion with only a wide, circular mouth where its face should have been that had tendrils on its lips.

I've been meaning to test a pair of rejects like yourselves against Titan. Just rough him up a bit, Modula told the monsters telepathically. Titan fired an arrow from its Cosmic Bow, but the scorpion caught it with its pincer and broke it seamlessly. The brown monster punched Titan with one tentacle claw, wrapped up an arm and a leg with two more and used the last one to snatch away the Cosmic Bow, breaking it with its knee. Titan fired its jets to try and knock off the brown monster, but it held on and grabbed Titan's shoulder with its free hand, its tentacle placing itself on the missile carriers.

"Quick! Fire a Neuron missile while its hand is there!" Lance said.

"But won't that damage us, too?" Ilana pointed out.

"It's the only way to weaken it! Do it!" he cried. Titan did so, and the explosion knocked away both combatants and split them apart. Titan rolled and rotated through space, unable to control itself.

"Attempting to stabilize balance. The explosion from the missile damaged the monster's circulation, but at a cost to our mobility," Octus informed them.

"I knew that was a bad idea," Ilana remarked. Before Lance could respond, its arms were grabbed by the scorpion from the front, who held it in place while it opened its gaping mouth to breathe sludge in Titan's face.

"Our shields are deteriorating from the toxins of its breath," Octus said.

"Use another Neuron missile!" Lance ordered.

"No, not yet! We've gotta shake this off some other way!" Ilana urged him.

"Do you have any ideas?" Lance asked with irritation.

"Yes." Ilana made Titan swing its legs forward and kicked the scorpion, moving Titan's legs back down as the scorpion was knocked away to stabilize it.

"Now we can fire the misiles!" Ilana declared. Titan did so, and the scorpion cringed and closed its mouth as the missile hit its exoskeleton.

"Its mouth seems to be the weak point. Also, the other Mutradi is behind us," Octus told the others. Titan quickly withdrew its sword and slashed at the creature from behind, slicing off a tentacle arm. The brown monster dodged another attack as Titan turned around and tried to slice at it again, with the scorpion now sneaking up on it. It tackled Titan from behind and gripped the robot's shoulders, tearing out the missiles and trying to dismantle them while it fought the brown monster. Meanwhile the brown Mutradi knocked the sword out of Titan's hands, forcing it to now rely on its shield.

"Our jets are disabled from the damage we're taking. Our armor will shatter if this keeps up," Octus warned. "I believe that…hold on. I've just discovered a new weapon. Initiating controlled self-destruct sequence!"

"WHAT?!" cried the teens.

Sorry if this chapter seemed to have a lot of dialogue in the fight. And to think I prized myself over having silent battles! I guess this one was special. After all, it was in space! …Where sound can't travel :/