Chapter 33: Malfunctions
The Salvation
Lowest Level
Clink. Clink. Clink.
Darkstalker listened to the sounds of his talons striking the cold metal floor of the Salvation, the circular glass nodes embedded in their dark scales ringing out softly through the halls. The cables strung across his body swung idly at his sides, as he made his way along the curvature of the vessel. Thick, glowing bars of light ran along each wall at shoulder level, energy pulsating through them as the Salvation carved a path between timelines.
Clink. Clink. Clink.
His tail dragged along behind him, his dark eyes glaring down the pathway ahead. Every now and then, a sharp pain would shoot up through one of his legs as he set it back down on the metal floor. His bones still ached from his injuries days prior, but he ignored the pain. He'd felt worse.
Clink. Clink. Clink.
Every step he took was a reminder of why he still drew breath, of the horrors that had turned him into what he was, the things he'd lost to their cruel grip, the….
"YEAUGH!"
Darkstalker barely had enough time to turn towards the source of the scream when a pale yellow dragon flew through the archway to his right, slamming into his side and sending him toppling over into the adjacent wall. He groaned, snorting the SandWing's short frills out of his face and kicking him off with his hind legs. The SandWing rolled across the metal floor, slowly getting to their feet.
"What is wrong with you?!" Darkstalker hissed, standing up as well.
Hidden winced. "Hey, she's the one who threw me across the friggin' hangar!" he said, pointing toward the chamber beyond the archway.
Across the massive space stood Lin, a half smirk etched onto her face. "Need I remind you that you're the one asked to spar with me once I had the bandages off!" Lin shouted back, her voice echoing across the hangar.
"Yeah, yeah…." Hidden sighed, massaging his right foreleg as he stepped back into the hangar. Darkstalker stepped in behind him, his train of thought usurped by the alluring prospect of watching the irritating SandWing have the scales beaten off of him.
"You ready for another round?" Lin asked as Hidden stepped up to face her, Darkstalker standing over by one of the shuttles.
"Nah, I think enough of my muscles have been tenderized for one day." Hidden replied.
Lin shrugged. "If you say so." she said, walking off towards another of the archways, leaving Hidden and Darkstalker alone in the hangar.
Hidden let out a sigh of relief, and made his way to the large monitor that had been hooked up to the RainWing's laptop. He grabbed one of his makeshift controllers, switched the laptop and monitor on, and flopped down on a pile of blankets that had been brought out of the storage bay, eyes glued to the screen. Darkstalker watched the SandWing for a moment, a slightly disappointed frown on his face, before starting towards the hallways.
"Where are you going?"
"My room." he stated, not even bothering to turn towards the SandWing.
Hidden smirked. "So you can brood some more?" he asked, eliciting an irritated glance from Darkstalker. "You know, you really missed out on that last timeline." he continued, "There were dragons that looked like friggin' salmon!"
"Salmon?" Darkstalker asked. He had to admit, for the briefest moment, the SandWing had him genuinely intrigued, but he quickly shook it off. Whatever trouble these dragons got themselves into, it was hardly his problem.
"Why don't you come over and hang for a bit. Clearly you've got nothin' better to do, and this game's got multiplayer." Hidden offered.
Darkstalker stared at the screen for a moment, a vibrant blocky world displayed across its surface. "Sounds like a waste of time to me." he said, walking off towards the archway.
"Hey, it'll be fun! Besides, I'm sure you could use a break from all that lonely singing."
Darkstalker snapped his head towards Hidden, glaring at him. Hidden grinned.
"Don't worry, I haven't been spying on you. Trust me, everyone can hear you in there." he said with a sly grin. Darkstalker took a slight step back, embarrassed, and Hidden chuckled.
A faint buzzing caught Darkstalker's attention, and he turned to see the makeshift Bippy 2 glide out from one of the adjacent hallways, a tall plastic bottle carried beneath it. It flew over his head, and hovered down next to Hidden, the SandWing grabbing the bottle from the drone and taking a large gulp of the water inside.
"So, you gonna join me or what?" Hidden asked, the drone flying back from whence it came.
"I think I'll pass." Darkstalker replied, turning once again to leave.
"Hey, uh, next timeline, you're coming out with us, okay?" Hidden stated as he started to step through the archway. Darkstalker paused, briefly turning back toward the SandWing with a raised brow, before walking off without another word.
"Oh, and while you're up there, could you ask Xavier if he wants to play Buildaria with me?! I'd text him, but we don't have…." Hidden shouted as Darkstalker left the hangar, his words trailing away as the NightWing walked up to an elevator.
Darkstalker sighed, stepping into the small metal box. He had half a mind to steal one of the shuttles and fly away from this ship as fast as possible, never to look back. But...where would he go? The multiverse wasn't exactly a very kind place to someone like...him.
The elevator door slid shut, and Darkstalker found himself staring at an all too familiar face in the shiny metal door. A NightWing, around 17 years of age, with twisting silver horns, jet black eyes, glowing cables draped between nodes spread across their body and plugged into the back of their jaw and talons, and two dull grey teardrop scales behind each eye.
The face of a failure.
His face.
The elevator door slid open, and Darkstalker stepped out into the brightly lit hall. Rounding a corner, he arrived in a corridor with many small metal doors situated on either side, small metal placards labeling each bunk, one through eight.
Darkstalker slowly made his way down the hallway towards his room, Bunk 2, when he paused, turning towards Bunk 3, which sat on the opposite side of the hall as his, shifted one room over. The RainWing's bunk, if he remembered correctly.
He groaned, staring down at the floor for a moment, before begrudgingly making his way over to the bunk's thick steel door. He pounded three times on it, the bangs echoing down the hall, and soon enough it opened to reveal a slightly surprised RainWing standing on the other side.
"O-Oh! Darkstalker! Wh-What are you doing here?" Xavier hesitantly asked, likely wondering why the NightWing had bothered to see him.
"Your SandWing friend wants to play some game with you down in the hangar, Build...something….?" Darkstalker grunted, wondering why he was bothering with Xavier as well.
"Oh, Buildaria." Xavier finished. "I'll be down in a minute." He paused, looking up at Darkstalker. His wounds from a week ago had for the most part healed over, though small spots of his scales were scarred over, unable to change color, and there were still a couple small holes in his wing membranes.
"I-It's nice to talk to ya, we rarely get to see you is all." Xavier continued. The two stared at each other silently for a moment, before Darkstalker turned, walking off towards his bunk without another word.
The door slid shut behind him, sealing him inside of the small chamber. There were no windows in his bunk, just a bright white light hanging from the ceiling, a single, wall mounted cot, and an empty desk.
Darkstalker sighed, flopping down onto the cot, the covers a tangled mess from never having been made in the week he had spent on them.
Finally, alone. he thought. He briefly remembered what Hidden had said earlier about hearing him in his bunk, and shuddered. Not perfectly alone, perhaps, but one of the next best things in this moons forsaken vessel….
"Warning! Slipline Drive overheating! Automated landing procedures initiated!"
The Salvation shook violently, tearing out of the spinning vortex and into yet another unknown timeline. Darkstalker groaned, and heard the sounds of doors opening in the hallway outside.
"What's this about?" Lin's muffled voice asked from the other side of the steel bunk door.
"Not sure, but it can't be good…." a second voice, Xavier's, replied. There was a brief pause, the faint sound of the Salvation's thrusters slowly diminishing as it came in for a landing, before the RainWing continued. "We should probably head up to the bridge, Ricky might know what's going on."
Darkstalker waited, snout buried in the messy sheets of his bed, as the sound of the two's talonsteps faded into the distance. He growled, debating for a moment whether to remain laying in the bunk, and let the others sort out whatever mess they had gotten themselves into, when he finally heaved himself up off of the cot. If something was wrong with the ship, then he might as well know what it was.
He pressed a button on the control pad next to the door, the steel barrier sliding out of the way as he stepped out into the hall. He slowly made his way down the hallway, in no particular rush, navigating the many corridors of the Salvation's upper levels towards the bridge.
"Hopping from timeline to timeline's just been so slow, so I thought we could just, you know, fly straight there!" Hidden explained, his voice echoing down the halls even before Darkstalker had reached the bridge. "I didn't know it'd fry the ship!"
"Haven't you been reading up on those...books, as you called them?" Lin asked.
"Yeah, but I hadn't exactly gotten to that part yet."
This'll be fun…. Darkstalker thought to himself, stepping into the bridge. Every other passenger aboard the Salvation was already gathered inside of the chamber. Ricky stood over by the main console, Xavier and Lin standing to his right, Hidden to his left, and the two humans standing by the edge of one of the trenches.
Darkstalker's attention didn't fall upon the eclectic group, though, instead immediately turning towards the wide window that ran across three of the chamber's walls. Outside raged one of the fiercest snowstorms the NightWing had ever seen, so thick and turbulent that the outside world was virtually impossible to make out.
"Do you...know if it'll be up and running again?" Ricky asked.
Hidden shrugged. "It seems like the ship automatically took precaution to prevent any serious damage, though I wouldn't be surprised if we were stuck here for a little while. Uh, Dark? You okay?"
Darkstalker blinked, suddenly realizing that he'd walked right up to the window. He briefly turned towards the group, and then back at the freezing landscape ahead.
"Wh...Where are we…?" he asked, though he had a sinking feeling he knew the answer.
"Oh, we're deep in IceWing territory now." Hidden explained, "Pleasant, isn't it?"
Of all the places in all the timelines in the multiverse they could have ended up, it just had to be the Ice Kingdom. Darkstalker felt a pulsating energy start to flow through him, the nodes along his body starting to glow with his frustration. He felt ready to turn around and head straight back to his bunk, but something strange caught his eye.
Beyond the billowing blizzard stood a tall, dark shadow, cloaked behind the violent veil of snow. At first, it was hard to make it out, but as the blizzard began to ease slightly, he was able to piece together a somewhat clearer image.
A tower, smooth and cylindrical, stretching up as far as the eye could see, with no visible endpoint. It looked alien, unnatural, like it didn't belong. There was something chilling about it, yet at the same time, something equally mysterious, and alluring.
The others seemed to have spotted it too, and had begun to step up next to him to stare out at the bizarre anomaly. Darkstalker grunted, shifting uncomfortably as they crowded up next to the sweeping window.
"Well, isn't that something." Hidden said with an excited grin.
AN:
It's crazy to me how far I've come in this story so far. I don't want to give away too much yet, but be prepared for the craziest episode yet!
I hope you enjoy Darkstalker's POV, even if he is a bit...melodramatic. He'll be pretty pivotal in the finale.
Stay tuned!
