Here we go! Next chapter! This one was one of my favorite ones to write! :D Thanks again to everyone who's been following this story!
DISCLAIMER: Everything belongs to Visceral Games and EA.
"I hope this part is painless enough," Isaac said as he killed more of the Necromorphs that were hard to spot at first. Once they were down, he proceeded to stomp on every box in the area, collecting the ammo, credits, and health packs inside them.
"Die!" game-Isaac hissed after the real Isaac entered a curb-stomping frenzy.
"I still find that hilarious," Tiedemann commented, chuckling heartily and helping himself to some snacks. Isaac chuckled to himself before finally entering Solar Array Sigma Zero Five. All the lights flared to life around game-Isaac just as a tall hologram of a woman appeared with her hands folded behind her back.
"Welcome to Solar Array Sigma Zero Five," she announced, "Proper identification is required. Please wait here. Watchman Howard Phillips will be with you shortly."
"How about not?" Hammond suggested, "Sadly, he's probably dead."
"In this game, everyone's dead," Kyne pointed out, "It's like Shakespeare's tragedies."
"True that," Tiedemann agreed, "True that, Hammond."
They all fell silent as Isaac quickly stopped at the Store, buying a few more items before making his way over to the Save Station. Before he could properly save, however, a few bands of red lights swept over his game character. "Whoa, what the hell?" Daina gasped.
"Your RIG is not authorized to access this area," the same voice from earlier announced, "Please step away from the door."
"At least she said 'please'," Kendra mused as Isaac continued to save the game anyway.
"Even when voices don't want you to get somewhere, they're still polite," Ellie laughed. Isaac just shook his head and allowed a smile to spread across his face as he looked around the room his game character was in. It wasn't until he reached Station Watchman Howard Philips's room and saw a bloody corpse on the bed that he realized what he had to do.
"Oh, hell no!" the engineer cried, "That is sick!"
"Don't tell me you're going to have to use his body as identification," Daina groaned, "Does that even work if the person is dead?"
"I guess we'll find out." With that, Isaac used Kinesis in order to pick up the Watchman's body. He carefully carried it over to the door, and they all watched in a horrified fascination as a few green lasers scanned the RIG on the body.
"RIG authorization recognized. Greetings, Station Watchman Howard Philips. I hope you slept well." With that, the hologram on the door switched to green as well, and game-Isaac crossed over to the other side.
"Damn," Daina whispered, "So it did work."
"That's crazy!" Stross agreed.
The easy access into the Solar Array didn't last long, however; as soon as the door shut behind him, a few mines suddenly activated right in front of him. "Unauthorized visitors detected. Auto defenses activated. Station Watchman Howard Philips, please provide verbal access code to authorize your guests."
"Busted!" Tiedemann laughed, slapping his knee.
"Not funny," Kyne growled, "We have to get through there."
"That shouldn't be too tough," Isaac replied, picking up a few metal barrels he had spotted, stepping back, and hurling them through the defenses. They each exploded successively, allowing game-Isaac to continue into the next room.
"What was that?" Stross suddenly gasped as they all watched something fly in the corner of the screen.
"Damn it!" Isaac cried, "A Leaper! I hate those Necromorphs!"
"They are rather annoying," Kyne agreed, settling back in his chair as he watched the systems engineer take them all on. At one point, he shot the window on the other side of the room, initiating decompression as he began to slide towards open space. Above where the window used to be was another switch, which he shot in order to close the door once again.
Once he was finished with that, game-Isaac made his way over to a control panel in a side room, which he used to hack into the elevator, as well as read about the security, named ANTI. "This ANTI sure doesn't sound very friendly," Isaac commented after reading the test logs about her.
"Maybe we have to shut her down?" Ellie suggested, and the others shrugged.
A few minutes later, game-Isaac boarded the newly unlocked elevator in the corner, taking care of a Slasher that was waiting for him on the next floor. "This area is too empty," Tiedemann mused, rubbing his hands against his chin.
Isaac pressed the appropriate buttons to make his character use Kinesis in order to pull down the bridge up ahead…only to trigger more defenses. "Aww, Tiedemann, you jinxed it!" Hammond joked. Tiedemann just shrugged.
"Clarke," game-Tiedemann began out of nowhere, "I know you're up there. Understand that even if you survive long enough to restore power, there is no escape. All routes in and out of government sector are being monitored. Give up, Clarke."
"So I order an evac of this space station and try to save over a million people," the real Tiedemann piped up, "Yet I want to kill Clarke and Stross. My character has some real issues in this game."
"Yeah, tell me about it," Isaac agreed as he destroyed the mines that were stretched out in front of him, "I didn't do anything to you. At least, not in real life."
"Of course not," Tiedemann replied breezily, waving his hand as Isaac continued to play the game. He proceeded to enter the next hallway, where the air instantly shut off and turned the whole hallway into a vacuum.
"Oh, man!" Kendra groaned, "That better not have been because of you, Tiedemann!"
"I hope not, either," Tiedemann retorted, watching as game-Isaac plowed through the silent hallway, breaking open boxes in order to collect items.
"AHH!" Nicole screamed from the back as a legless Stalker appeared out of nowhere and crawled towards Isaac's character.
"Whoa, shit!" Isaac cursed, pumping the Necromorph full of lead, "They just had to stick one of those in this part, didn't they?"
"It's not Dead Space without a few surprise attacks," Kyne pointed out, "I see they kept that aspect of the series."
"Yeah," Hammond agreed, "Other than that, it's pretty much been an action game."
After Isaac finished taking care of the Stalker, he made his way over to the control panel just up ahead, which he hacked into in order to restore air to the hallway and unlock the door up ahead. The entire time he had been in this area, the same hologram of ANTI had just watched him, even about-facing to stare at him as he had hacked his way into the system. "That's creepy," Isaac commented, "I actually didn't realize she was watching me in the first room with Howard Philips."
"She's everywhere!" Ellie joked.
"Not funny," Isaac replied, though he had to chuckle to himself as well. He entered the next room, where the door behind him suddenly locked and the same voice from ANTI announced his presence.
"Unauthorized visitor, mainframe," she said.
"Computer, this is Director Tiedemann," game-Tiedemann suddenly spoke up into the loudspeaker, "Disable all Solar Array Functions immediately."
"Tiedemann!" everyone in the room groaned just as the lockdown initiated.
"Really, Hans?" Kendra snorted, "Really?"
"Hey, don't blame me!" Tiedemann cried, holding his hands up in front of him.
"I'm sorry, Clarke," game-Tiedemann apologized insincerely, "I know what you're trying to do, and I cannot allow you to succeed. There is too much at stake."
"Why not?" Isaac asked. Tiedemann just shrugged.
The next part was relatively easy, all ten of them found; after crawling through the vent in the middle of the room, Isaac entered one of the side rooms, where he proceeded to use Kinesis in order to take all the red blocks out of the wall and place them in the right slots.
"By far," Stross spoke up, "This appears to be the easiest puzzle in the whole game."
"I agree," Mercer agreed, "I hope the rest of the game is like this."
Except for a few Necromorphs that popped out every now and then, game-Isaac was doing all right, and everyone became absorbed by the game play. He used the rearranged pieces in order to unlock the main frame, all while ANTI kept announcing his unwanted presence.
"Unauthorized visitor, mainframe."
"She sure has a knack for repeating herself," Ellie chuckled after ANTI had announced this for a third time.
"That she does," Stross concurred, suddenly clutching his arm as he eagerly watched game-Isaac continue to take down ANTI room by room. Daina was the only one to notice Stross doing this at first, and she decided to keep quiet about it. For now.
A few minutes later…
By the time Isaac directed himself to the second room, he finished solving the puzzle and watched as ANTI's defenses finally went down. A few Necromorphs burst out of a vent opposite where game-Isaac was at the same time. "Mainframe containment compromised," the robotic, female voice reported, "Security has been notified."
"Would that security happen to be the Necromorphs?" Daina asked, watching as they stood outside and waited for game-Isaac to return.
"If I have my own personal army of Necromorphs, then yeah," Tiedemann said, "I still have no idea what my character has against Clarke's."
Everyone fell silent as Isaac used the Detonator to set up some mines around the perimeter of the mainframe, just in case any Necromorphs happened to try and attack him. Satisfied with his defenses, game-Isaac proceeded to shoot all the fuses that were in a circle right in the center. Sure enough, in that time, a few Necromorphs popped out in an attempt to ambush game-Isaac, but they ended up blowing themselves up from the mines. "That was a smart strategy, Isaac," Stross complimented.
"Thanks," the engineer thanked him, moving on to shoot the last fuse in order to effectively "kill" the computer.
"Automated functions…offline. Lllockouts…offfline. Ssstation reverting to…manual operation only. ANTI…offfffffliiiiiiiine." The voice got progressively deeper and more elongated, which made everyone burst out laughing.
"I never thought I'd laugh at a computer crashing," Kendra chortled, wrapping her arms around her midsection. After slowly dying, the computer system crashed, and the door up ahead unlocked. Once Isaac realized he couldn't go back to save his progress, he decided to keep going. He opened the door only to find…
"AHH!" Isaac, Stross, Daina, and Kyne screamed as a body fell on game-Isaac.
"Oh my God, get off me!" Isaac cried, quickly moving away from the body as it collapsed onto the ground.
"That was scary," Daina whispered, accidentally clutching onto the same arm Stross was holding. She quickly withdrew her hand.
"Ellie," game-Isaac announced into his RIG as he started a video log, "I'm on my way to the mirrors now. I have to realign them manually. How's Stross?"
"See for yourself,"game-Ellie replied as she sent him a video log of the two of them. She focused the camera on game-Stross as he began to have a panic attack.
"No, I'm not ready to have the needle again!" he yelled, "You have to let me out! I can't breathe! Let me out!"
"Stross, what's wrong?" game-Isaac asked, "Ellie?"
"He's waiting for me!" game-Stross wailed as the camera cut out.
For the next few seconds, nobody knew what to say, except Stross clutched his arm even tighter now as he hyperventilated a little bit. "I see the game got my claustrophobia down pat," he said in a shaky voice, "I never liked close spaces."
"Me neither," Kyne agreed, "I know how you feel, Nolan." Stross just shuddered.
Isaac continued to play through more of the game just as the Components from the first game made an appearance. "Oh, crap!" he groaned, "These things are back!"
"Oh, these enemies are so annoying!" Hammond agreed, "And the head component has a really sick death!"
"Oh my," Daina gasped, "I'm not sure I want to see it."
"I don't think you do," Kendra agreed, "It's seriously messed up."
"Maybe another time," Isaac reasoned.
"Good idea," Nicole spoke up from the back. Now that some time had passed, she wasn't as angry as she had been before. Maybe she could sit next to Isaac again. She'd have to see.
As game-Isaac continued to kill all the Components, he broke open more boxes and picked up the ammo, credits, and health packs inside, though there were less health packs due to the difficulty the engineer was playing on.
He soon entered the next room, where a few Enhanced Leapers attacked him as he used Stasis to take them all down. "Hey, what's that over there?" Mercer asked, pointing at something pink.
"There's something familiar about that," Isaac mumbled, remembering a poster he had seen on the Ishimura while he was playing through the first game. Now that all the Necromorphs were gone, he was free to use Kinesis in order to pick it up.
"There's Always Peng," Isaac read as the achievement flashed across the bottom of the screen.
"Peng?" Ellie asked, scrunching her nose up, "What's Peng?"
"There was a poster of a woman that said that in the first game," Isaac explained, "But I don't know what it is. I never did pick up the Peng Treasure in the first game, did I?"
All the old timers shook their heads.
"Once I finish this game, I'm going to go back to find it."
A few minutes later…
"At least I can save now," Isaac said happily as he saved the game after using one of his Power Nodes to get into the storage room next to the Save Station. Once he completed that, he hacked the door next to him in order to unlock it.
"Are we going to the Solar Array at last?" Tiedemann asked.
"I think so," Isaac answered, "There's nowhere else to go." He pushed the appropriate button to open the door just as the screen turned orange again and game-Nicole appeared in the seat just up ahead.
"Great," Nicole muttered sarcastically to herself.
"How do you do it?" game-Nicole hissed from where she sat, "How do you hold it all inside, your face never betraying your pain? No one would ever know the guilt you feel, never know the dark thoughts you keep." She lingered for a little bit before disappearing.
"What…the…hell?" everyone muttered.
"What are you talking about, Nicole?" Isaac asked, turning to face his girlfriend, who just shrugged.
"Whatever you did, it wasn't good," she replied noncommittally, and Isaac couldn't help but wonder if she was referring to his supposed flirting with Ellie. Shrugging, he pressed the button to make the elevator ascend to the Solar Array at last.
"I wonder what that seat Nicole was sitting in before is for," Stross said, tilting his head to the side.
"I guess we'll find out," Kyne assured him, and they all watched in fascination as game-Isaac finally made it to the Solar Array. Across from him was Saturn, and all ten people in the room gasped in amazement.
"Wow," they whispered.
"Those are some amazing graphics," Hammond added, widening his eyes, "How did they pull it off?"
"I don't know, but I love it," Kendra agreed, smiling as Isaac moved a little further into the zero-gravity and vacuum environment.
"Ellie," game-Isaac said, "It looks like two of the mirrors are out of alignment. How's he doing?"
"You don't have to keep checking on me, you know," Stross quipped.
"Uhh, I think he does," Ellie told him, and he tightened his grip on his arm.
"He's stopped hyperventilating, but I don't know how much longer he'll last. I knew he would just slow me down."
"Thanks a lot," Stross hissed to himself.
"If Stross dies," game-Isaac cut in, "So do our chances of destroying the Marker. Keep him alive and get to that panel."
"I'll try," game-Ellie responded, "Wish me luck."
"Good luck," Daina said out loud. Everyone watched as game-Isaac refilled on his air before moving on. He used Bread Crumbs in order to direct himself over to the first mirror, and once he made it, he used Kinesis in order to align it with one of the other mirrors-a fairly simple task.
"All right, Ellie, one down," game-Isaac reported, "How's it looking on your end?"
"I'm trying to roll back the cover now. Stross, can you give me a hand with this?"
"He'll hurt me!" game-Stross cried, "I'm not strong enough!"
"Yes, you are," Daina piped up.
"I promise I'll protect you," game-Ellie assured him, "Now just get over here and give me a hand." With that, everyone could make the sound of game-Stross and game-Ellie opening the collector's panel.
"Wow, I actually listened to you," Stross gasped, "I can't believe it."
"There's something covering the collector's panel…Oh my God!"
"Uh oh," Isaac mused, "What's going on?"
"There's hun-there's thousands of them! They're breaking apart!"
"Ellie, get out of there!" game-Isaac shouted.
"Oh, God, they're heading this way! Run, Stross! Run!"
"Ellie! Ellie, come in! Ellie!" But game-Ellie was gone.
"Shit," game-Isaac murmured under his breath.
"I hope we don't die," Ellie said, nudging Stross in his shoulder and making him clutch his arm even tighter.
"Why do you do that, Stross?" Daina suddenly piped up, unable to hold her question inside anymore.
"Do what?" Stross inquired as Isaac refilled on his air and went to take out the Nest Necromorph in the area.
"Clutch your arm like that," Daina told him, "I notice you've been doing that since the middle of this chapter."
Stross blanched as he suddenly noticed just how tightly he was gripping his arm. "Oh!" he gasped, "It's…uhh…a nervous habit."
"Clutching one of your arms is a nervous habit?" Mercer asked with a skeptic tone.
"Yes!" Stross insisted, narrowing his eyes, "I like to hold onto myself to calm down. My arm is the closest thing I can reach."
The others thought this was a little strange, but they decided to just let it go for now. Nolan Stross was starting to show an eccentric side to them now.
In the game, game-Isaac managed to take out the Nest, and then he refilled his air as he went to realign the other mirror, which he finished in record time as well. A beam in the center of the Solar Array suddenly turned on and began to rotate, and "Objective Complete" flashed across the screen.
"Yay, we did it!" Kendra cheered, fist pumping the air.
"Holy shit, Isaac!" game-Ellie gasped once she got back in contact with him again.
"Ellie! Ellie, are you all right?" game-Isaac asked.
"We just made it into the crossover tube when the beam hit! Isaac, those things are still heading for the Transport Hub. They're wrecking everything in their path!"
"Oh, shit!" game-Isaac cursed, "They'll cut us off! Get to the hub! I'll meet you as soon as I can!"
"Go! Go! Go!" Kendra, Hammond, and Tiedemann began to chant as Isaac made himself fly back to the elevator shaft.
"I would say 'Run, Forest, Run'," Nicole added, "But since you're not exactly running…"
"Fly, Forest, Fly!" Daina joked, making everyone laugh.
In the game, Isaac finally made it back to the elevator shaft when he decided to contact game-Ellie. "Ellie, come in!" he cried.
"Isaac! We have to cross to the Government Sector before they cut us off! You'll never make it down here in time!"
"I'll be there!" game-Isaac thundered, "I'll be there!"
"Whoa, chill out, Isaac," Ellie coaxed, laughing a little bit, "I know you'll be there."
"Of course I will," Isaac assured her, and when the seat behind him unlocked, everyone realized what it was for.
"Oh, boy," Hammond whispered, watching as game-Isaac climbed into the seat.
"Instability detected in the Array Alignment. Emergency ejector systems initializing." Everyone watched with wide eyes as shoulder restraints lowered over game-Isaac as the seat lifted up into the air.
"Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!" Kendra squealed, "I'm so excited for this part!"
"I spy a badass scene approaching," Isaac added. The elevator shaft opened to outer space, and suddenly, the seat accelerated forward.
"Holy shit!" Stross gasped, continuing to clutch his arm just as the seat ejected Isaac's character into space. With that, he turned on the accelerators in his boots as he began to fly past all the debris around him.
"Oh…my…God!" Ellie petitioned, only it was one of excitement.
"That is badass!" all the guys shouted as Isaac continued to fly through and around the debris. The engineer had a huge smile on his face the whole time as he guided himself through space.
"Go, Isaac!" Nicole cheered from the back, for even she couldn't contain her excitement in this part of the level.
"How did you get to be so epic?" Hammond inquired, "Not that that's a bad thing, but still…"
"This is my favorite part of the game so far," Isaac declared, "I called it."
"Look at him go!" Stross cried as game-Isaac managed to fly through a small hole in a rather large chunk of debris.
"There is someone this part reminds me of," Kyne mused, thoughtfully rubbing his chin, "But I can't think of the name…"
"Who cares?" Ellie asked, "This is an awesome part of the game!"
"Damn straight," Nicole added, shocked that she was actually agreeing with Ellie on something.
Everyone just settled back and watched as Isaac made himself aim for a particular building. The music picked up and eventually reached its crescendo as game-Isaac crashed through the roof and tumbled down the shaft. He then spread out his hands and used the turbo boosts in his boots in order to slow himself down, landing gently on the ground and ending one of the most epic sequences in Dead Space 2.
Hammond couldn't help it; he placed two fingers in his mouth, whistled, and began to clap. "I loved that part!" he cried, and the joy spread to everyone else, who also began whistling and cheering.
"Badass!" Isaac, Ellie, Tiedemann, Nicole, and Daina yelled as well, and Tiedemann raised his bottle of beer in the air.
"I think that scene made up for anything else," Mercer decided, nodding as he leaned back in his seat.
That was when the phone suddenly began to ring, making Isaac pause the game in surprise. Everyone stared at it, and the caller ID revealed that it was an unknown name and unknown number. "Should we answer it?" Daina asked with concern.
"Might as well," Isaac mumbled, picking up the phone. "Hello?" he asked.
"Is this Isaac Clarke?" the unfamiliar voice on the other end responded.
Isaac narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Yes," he replied, "Who's calling?"
"A big fan of superhero comics. I just played the part of the game where you fly through all that debris."
What the hell? Isaac thought. "That's…nice," he stammered, "How'd you get my number?"
The person on the other end laughed. "That's not important. There is something I wanted to say, though."
"And what would that be?"
The person laughed again, and the next thing he said shocked Isaac.
"You could be Iron Man's twin brother. Iron Clarke!"