Jumainji-seaQuest Style
by Shell Lee
Ortiz looked around. His head still hurt but it was getting better. The first thing they did after getting off the bridge was get some guns. Then they looked for survivors. Most of the people they found were dead. Some were unrecognizable, others weren't. Everyone looked like they'd been through a war.
Between the two of them they only found five people alive. One of those people was so badly hurt that it was a kindness to kill them. The other four they sent to secure some working shuttles and guard them. Ortiz sent a silent prayer up, both for the souls of the dead and those still living.
Up ahead he spotted someone coming their way. The figure was clutching its arm and as it got closer, they could see it was Jim, a bunch of monkeys right behind him.
"Shit." Ortiz looked at the captain. He couldn't have heard that right. The captain didn't swear. Shaking it off, he raised his gun and shot at the monkeys, providing cover for Jim as he ran towards them. The guns didn't seem to have much of an effect on them though. Ortiz could hear the captain behind him opening a door. They didn't have much time after Jim got to them before the monkeys would be on them.
Ortiz continued to shoot at the monkeys, even though the gun didn't have much of an effect. Soon Brody was in range. Bridger caught an arm and guided him into the room, Ortiz following, shutting the door behind them.
All three breathed a bit easier after it shut.
***
Ford opened his eyes. His head hurt, badly, and he was confused. What happened?
"Welcome back to the land of the living, Commander." That was Wendy. She was sitting by his bed, stroking his hair. That felt good.
"What happened?"
"You hit your head." It was nice. She was nice. That made sense. He hit his head and dreamed all of it. It was nothing more than a bad dream.
"I had the weirdest dream." Tony stepped into his line of sight.
"Well they can't get any stranger than reality. It's your turn." No, he must have heard him wrong. The game was just a dream.
"What turn?"
"You don't remember the game? Do you have amnesia or something?" Even though the question was directed at Ford, Tony looked at Wendy for the answer.
Ford hadn't heard wrong. He groaned.
"Well, amnesia or not, it's your turn. Come on. We have a game to play."
***
It took them a while but they finally found somewhere that wasn't full of monkeys, snake infested, or covered in vines. That the place was one of the mess halls was a plus. None of them had anything to eat since that morning.
Because it didn't have any monkeys in it didn't mean that they hadn't trashed it already. There were tables bent over and broken chairs everywhere. There were some tables that were relatively unharmed, and the quartet chose one near the back so they could see anything that forced its way in there. The fact that whatever tried to come in had to navigate the mess just made it all the more appealing. Unfourtunatly the monkeys had eaten all the food.
Tim had just set up the game board when the lights flickered for the first time. Increasingly uneasy, the four sat down to play.
"Should get flashlights."
"Tony, shut up."
Commander Ford rolled the dice. The first token moved forward six spaces. A new message appeared.
"At night they fly,
You'd better run.
These winged things
Are not much fun."
A white drop hit the game board right on top of Ford's token, making the dice rattle. It startled Tony, who automatically looked up, and saw bats, lots and lots of bats. He couldn't see the ceiling there were so many. Little brown bodies all crawling over each other.
Tony opened his mouth to say something along the lines of "Shit" only to find Ford's hand covering his mouth. His eyes dropped down to look at the Commander. Ford put a finger up to his lips and pointed downwards, before taking his hand off Tony's mouth. They silently slipped under the table. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the others follow suit.
Safely under the table Lucas whispered, "What are those things?"
"Bats. Let's get out of here. Don't make any noise." Tony watched as Ford slowly got up and went towards the door. Tony got up and quickly folded the game board. Murphy was being a dick, or maybe the gods of Jumanji didn't like them, but they got to just in front of the door before the shit hit the fan.
Tim tripped over the leg of one of the chairs, sending it and him tumbling and crashing across the floor. Everything went still for just one moment. The moment of calm before the storm. The eye of the hurricane.
And then the bats descended on them.
Tony heard Lucas scream and he raised his arms up. The game board along with then giving him some protection from the flying rats. They were everywhere, clawing at his hair and clothes. Lucas was still screaming some where to his right. He couldn't see anything past a few feet. Not that he put his head up for long enough to really look.
Tony raced for the door, hoping that Ford was able to get it open. He tripped over two chairs and a table on his way out. Finally, he got to the door and ran through it. It wasn't much better in the hallway than the room. Apparently the surplus of bats had spilled over into the hallway. Shit, he could still hear Lucas screaming inside that godforsaken room. That mean Lucas was still inside somewhere.
Tony set the game board down, so he wouldn't lose it, and, protecting his face with his forearms, he ran back into the room. He didn't know how he was going to find Lucas, but it didn't matter at that point. Tony was going on instinct and adrenaline.
The screaming was coming from over by where the table was, but now he had to navigate back through the other tables and chairs. Calling himself and Lucas every kind of stupid, he tripped over another chair.
The bats appeared to be thinning out. Probably out into the hallway and from there out into the rest of the ship. Before long there weren't any left in the room. Lucas still screaming, stood waving his arms, not two feet from the table Ford rolled the dice on.
He picked himself up off the floor and walked over to Lucas. "Lucas. Lucas! Stop!" Tony grabbed the moving arms. "LUCAS! They're gone." Once he stopped screaming, Tony walked out of the room muttering about how dumb he was for going back in, how stupid you'd have to be to just stand there and damn flying rats. Lucas stood there, dumbfounded.
Tony turned and said, "Well, aren't you coming?"
***
Jim was going on pure adrenaline as him, Ortiz, and the captain made their way to whatever might be left of med bay. His upper arm throbbed and his legs felt like they could give out on him at any moment. He was loosing blood fast.
He had been inspecting the weapons storage lockers, something he as security chief did every month, when the monkey attacked him. They took him by complete surprise. Who expected aggressive monkeys on a submarine like seaQuest anyway? Who expected monkeys period?
The monkey had a length of pipe that split his arm open and pushed him backwards into the open weapons locker, lucky for him. Grabbing the first gun his hand came into contact with, he rolled over to have a clear shot at his attacker. The shots Jim fired, while not hurting the monkey, made it pause long enough for him to make a mad dash for the door.
Once in the hallway though, he found he wasn't home free. Two more of the little beast were fighting out there, and there was the one behind him. He had only one choice left to him. He ran.
Now he was still running, ok walking, but now he didn't have three monkeys behind him. Jim grimaced as Ortiz stumbled, hitting his injured arm. The two of them went down in a tangle of limbs.
"Ouch." Jim's arm hurt and now his ass hurt too. It couldn't have been that great for Ortiz's head either.
Bridger stopped and looked at his two men. Neither one was in the best of shape. Before he could help them up though there was a rumbling sound, almost like an old fashioned train, coming down the hall way.
Jim heard it, too. He caught a glimpse of a wall of black coming at them, before Bridger dove on top of them. Keeping them all close to the floor and letting the bats pass overhead.
***
Tony and Lucas found the other two players holed up in a room not far from the mess that they had been playing in. Ford had grabbed Tim and pulled them both down the hall into an open door. The bats hadn't seemed all that interested in the room, so they stayed there until the bats had passed.
That turn hadn't seemed all that bad. No one got hurt or lost from the group, and they hadn't lost the game board or dice. It was Tony's turn.
Tony picked up the dice and was about to roll.
"Wait," Tim said, "why do we need to finish the game? What if nothing goes away? Wouldn't it be better not to finish?"
"What if it all does go away?" Lucas shot back. "What if everything goes back to normal? And if we don't finish the game it wont.
"Tony saw the movie. What exactly happened at the end of the movie? Was it good or bad?"
"I.. um.. I never finished it." Everyone groaned.
"Hey, I was a kid and the movie scared me. I never felt the need to finish it once I grew up." Tony looked at everyone. "It wasn't like I knew that it was going to be important someday."
"Enough. Good or bad, we wont know until we finish the game. So let's just get on with it."
The dice rolled across the game board. A six and a one faced up.
"Hyenas, lions, and leopards,
Predators one and all
Beware they're not here
For a social call."
Lucas looked over as a low growl came from behind Tony. There stood the largest cat he had ever seen. Before anyone could move it was on Tony.
Lucas stood up and took a couple of steps backwards. To his right he saw Ford pick up a chair and rushed the cat. He brought the chair down hard over its back. The cat turned on him.
Lucas saw a flash of steal, then the cat let out a ungodly scream and turned back on Tony. Lucas felt helpless standing there watching as his roommate and the commander took on the cat. He heard Tim scream and turned around. Sitting there watching was a whole pride of lions, a leopard and some hyenas. Lucas just stared at them.
There was no way they were getting out of this one.
***
Ortiz had been watching Bridger for awhile now, despite his pounding headache. The captain was ahead of them, looking out for anything that might hurt the two walking wounded. Ortiz helped Jim stand up and Jim helped Ortiz stand up. That left Bridger to look out for monkeys, vines, bats, and anything else that might pop out at them.
The captain seemed to know the dangers really well.
"Do you get the feeling the captain's played the game before?" Jim asked, mirroring Ortiz's own internal musings.
"Yeah, I do. Should we ask?" Ortiz looked over at his companion. Jim had lost a lot of blood, and his face was screwed up in pain. Ortiz knew he wasn't doing much better. They needed to get to the med bay first.
Up ahead, Bridger stopped. He was looking at something on the floor. Whatever it was it didn't look good.
"What's up, Captain?"
Bridger looked over his shoulder at Jim, and then he turned back to whatever it was on the floor. "It's a snake. A very large snake." Bridger stood up. "Don't worry, it's dead."
There was a silence all around them. It was only broken by some monkeys somewhere echoing down the halls, some snakes hissing, the beat of bat wings, and by a couple of men bickering.
"Ask him."
"No you ask him."
"It was your idea you ask."
The trio still somehow managed to make it to med bay in one piece.
by Shell Lee
Ortiz looked around. His head still hurt but it was getting better. The first thing they did after getting off the bridge was get some guns. Then they looked for survivors. Most of the people they found were dead. Some were unrecognizable, others weren't. Everyone looked like they'd been through a war.
Between the two of them they only found five people alive. One of those people was so badly hurt that it was a kindness to kill them. The other four they sent to secure some working shuttles and guard them. Ortiz sent a silent prayer up, both for the souls of the dead and those still living.
Up ahead he spotted someone coming their way. The figure was clutching its arm and as it got closer, they could see it was Jim, a bunch of monkeys right behind him.
"Shit." Ortiz looked at the captain. He couldn't have heard that right. The captain didn't swear. Shaking it off, he raised his gun and shot at the monkeys, providing cover for Jim as he ran towards them. The guns didn't seem to have much of an effect on them though. Ortiz could hear the captain behind him opening a door. They didn't have much time after Jim got to them before the monkeys would be on them.
Ortiz continued to shoot at the monkeys, even though the gun didn't have much of an effect. Soon Brody was in range. Bridger caught an arm and guided him into the room, Ortiz following, shutting the door behind them.
All three breathed a bit easier after it shut.
***
Ford opened his eyes. His head hurt, badly, and he was confused. What happened?
"Welcome back to the land of the living, Commander." That was Wendy. She was sitting by his bed, stroking his hair. That felt good.
"What happened?"
"You hit your head." It was nice. She was nice. That made sense. He hit his head and dreamed all of it. It was nothing more than a bad dream.
"I had the weirdest dream." Tony stepped into his line of sight.
"Well they can't get any stranger than reality. It's your turn." No, he must have heard him wrong. The game was just a dream.
"What turn?"
"You don't remember the game? Do you have amnesia or something?" Even though the question was directed at Ford, Tony looked at Wendy for the answer.
Ford hadn't heard wrong. He groaned.
"Well, amnesia or not, it's your turn. Come on. We have a game to play."
***
It took them a while but they finally found somewhere that wasn't full of monkeys, snake infested, or covered in vines. That the place was one of the mess halls was a plus. None of them had anything to eat since that morning.
Because it didn't have any monkeys in it didn't mean that they hadn't trashed it already. There were tables bent over and broken chairs everywhere. There were some tables that were relatively unharmed, and the quartet chose one near the back so they could see anything that forced its way in there. The fact that whatever tried to come in had to navigate the mess just made it all the more appealing. Unfourtunatly the monkeys had eaten all the food.
Tim had just set up the game board when the lights flickered for the first time. Increasingly uneasy, the four sat down to play.
"Should get flashlights."
"Tony, shut up."
Commander Ford rolled the dice. The first token moved forward six spaces. A new message appeared.
"At night they fly,
You'd better run.
These winged things
Are not much fun."
A white drop hit the game board right on top of Ford's token, making the dice rattle. It startled Tony, who automatically looked up, and saw bats, lots and lots of bats. He couldn't see the ceiling there were so many. Little brown bodies all crawling over each other.
Tony opened his mouth to say something along the lines of "Shit" only to find Ford's hand covering his mouth. His eyes dropped down to look at the Commander. Ford put a finger up to his lips and pointed downwards, before taking his hand off Tony's mouth. They silently slipped under the table. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the others follow suit.
Safely under the table Lucas whispered, "What are those things?"
"Bats. Let's get out of here. Don't make any noise." Tony watched as Ford slowly got up and went towards the door. Tony got up and quickly folded the game board. Murphy was being a dick, or maybe the gods of Jumanji didn't like them, but they got to just in front of the door before the shit hit the fan.
Tim tripped over the leg of one of the chairs, sending it and him tumbling and crashing across the floor. Everything went still for just one moment. The moment of calm before the storm. The eye of the hurricane.
And then the bats descended on them.
Tony heard Lucas scream and he raised his arms up. The game board along with then giving him some protection from the flying rats. They were everywhere, clawing at his hair and clothes. Lucas was still screaming some where to his right. He couldn't see anything past a few feet. Not that he put his head up for long enough to really look.
Tony raced for the door, hoping that Ford was able to get it open. He tripped over two chairs and a table on his way out. Finally, he got to the door and ran through it. It wasn't much better in the hallway than the room. Apparently the surplus of bats had spilled over into the hallway. Shit, he could still hear Lucas screaming inside that godforsaken room. That mean Lucas was still inside somewhere.
Tony set the game board down, so he wouldn't lose it, and, protecting his face with his forearms, he ran back into the room. He didn't know how he was going to find Lucas, but it didn't matter at that point. Tony was going on instinct and adrenaline.
The screaming was coming from over by where the table was, but now he had to navigate back through the other tables and chairs. Calling himself and Lucas every kind of stupid, he tripped over another chair.
The bats appeared to be thinning out. Probably out into the hallway and from there out into the rest of the ship. Before long there weren't any left in the room. Lucas still screaming, stood waving his arms, not two feet from the table Ford rolled the dice on.
He picked himself up off the floor and walked over to Lucas. "Lucas. Lucas! Stop!" Tony grabbed the moving arms. "LUCAS! They're gone." Once he stopped screaming, Tony walked out of the room muttering about how dumb he was for going back in, how stupid you'd have to be to just stand there and damn flying rats. Lucas stood there, dumbfounded.
Tony turned and said, "Well, aren't you coming?"
***
Jim was going on pure adrenaline as him, Ortiz, and the captain made their way to whatever might be left of med bay. His upper arm throbbed and his legs felt like they could give out on him at any moment. He was loosing blood fast.
He had been inspecting the weapons storage lockers, something he as security chief did every month, when the monkey attacked him. They took him by complete surprise. Who expected aggressive monkeys on a submarine like seaQuest anyway? Who expected monkeys period?
The monkey had a length of pipe that split his arm open and pushed him backwards into the open weapons locker, lucky for him. Grabbing the first gun his hand came into contact with, he rolled over to have a clear shot at his attacker. The shots Jim fired, while not hurting the monkey, made it pause long enough for him to make a mad dash for the door.
Once in the hallway though, he found he wasn't home free. Two more of the little beast were fighting out there, and there was the one behind him. He had only one choice left to him. He ran.
Now he was still running, ok walking, but now he didn't have three monkeys behind him. Jim grimaced as Ortiz stumbled, hitting his injured arm. The two of them went down in a tangle of limbs.
"Ouch." Jim's arm hurt and now his ass hurt too. It couldn't have been that great for Ortiz's head either.
Bridger stopped and looked at his two men. Neither one was in the best of shape. Before he could help them up though there was a rumbling sound, almost like an old fashioned train, coming down the hall way.
Jim heard it, too. He caught a glimpse of a wall of black coming at them, before Bridger dove on top of them. Keeping them all close to the floor and letting the bats pass overhead.
***
Tony and Lucas found the other two players holed up in a room not far from the mess that they had been playing in. Ford had grabbed Tim and pulled them both down the hall into an open door. The bats hadn't seemed all that interested in the room, so they stayed there until the bats had passed.
That turn hadn't seemed all that bad. No one got hurt or lost from the group, and they hadn't lost the game board or dice. It was Tony's turn.
Tony picked up the dice and was about to roll.
"Wait," Tim said, "why do we need to finish the game? What if nothing goes away? Wouldn't it be better not to finish?"
"What if it all does go away?" Lucas shot back. "What if everything goes back to normal? And if we don't finish the game it wont.
"Tony saw the movie. What exactly happened at the end of the movie? Was it good or bad?"
"I.. um.. I never finished it." Everyone groaned.
"Hey, I was a kid and the movie scared me. I never felt the need to finish it once I grew up." Tony looked at everyone. "It wasn't like I knew that it was going to be important someday."
"Enough. Good or bad, we wont know until we finish the game. So let's just get on with it."
The dice rolled across the game board. A six and a one faced up.
"Hyenas, lions, and leopards,
Predators one and all
Beware they're not here
For a social call."
Lucas looked over as a low growl came from behind Tony. There stood the largest cat he had ever seen. Before anyone could move it was on Tony.
Lucas stood up and took a couple of steps backwards. To his right he saw Ford pick up a chair and rushed the cat. He brought the chair down hard over its back. The cat turned on him.
Lucas saw a flash of steal, then the cat let out a ungodly scream and turned back on Tony. Lucas felt helpless standing there watching as his roommate and the commander took on the cat. He heard Tim scream and turned around. Sitting there watching was a whole pride of lions, a leopard and some hyenas. Lucas just stared at them.
There was no way they were getting out of this one.
***
Ortiz had been watching Bridger for awhile now, despite his pounding headache. The captain was ahead of them, looking out for anything that might hurt the two walking wounded. Ortiz helped Jim stand up and Jim helped Ortiz stand up. That left Bridger to look out for monkeys, vines, bats, and anything else that might pop out at them.
The captain seemed to know the dangers really well.
"Do you get the feeling the captain's played the game before?" Jim asked, mirroring Ortiz's own internal musings.
"Yeah, I do. Should we ask?" Ortiz looked over at his companion. Jim had lost a lot of blood, and his face was screwed up in pain. Ortiz knew he wasn't doing much better. They needed to get to the med bay first.
Up ahead, Bridger stopped. He was looking at something on the floor. Whatever it was it didn't look good.
"What's up, Captain?"
Bridger looked over his shoulder at Jim, and then he turned back to whatever it was on the floor. "It's a snake. A very large snake." Bridger stood up. "Don't worry, it's dead."
There was a silence all around them. It was only broken by some monkeys somewhere echoing down the halls, some snakes hissing, the beat of bat wings, and by a couple of men bickering.
"Ask him."
"No you ask him."
"It was your idea you ask."
The trio still somehow managed to make it to med bay in one piece.