((A/N: I. Hate. The. Caves.
More reviews please…? hears crickets chirp))
Chapter 7: The Kink in the Wind and the Way
Rico set down another message capsule, glancing back at Danielle. She looked exhausted, sweat dripping down her face. Rico knew she needed to rest soon. Her performance was suffering. Danielle had trouble hitting the altered beasts that inhabited the caves, her movements becoming sluggish. Rico was handling the heat better than Danielle, at least.
"Gah… it's hot…" Danielle muttered for what seemed like the hundredth time, wiping her forehead with her good forearm. "We've been in here forever…"
"It's been about half an hour," Rico corrected. "We should be getting out of these caves soon enough. I doubt they go on forever." Rico gripped her Red Saber tightly, walking over to where Danielle leaned against the wall, slightly doubled over. "Will you be able to hold up long enough?"
She glanced up slightly, panting slightly, but managing a shaky nod. "I think so… Came this far, haven't I?"
Rico gave her a reassuring smile, amazed by Danielle's strength of will. Despite being thrown into all of this, she was holding up pretty well for a civilian in such a crazy situation. "Well, if that's so, let's go then." Rico strode past her towards the metal door in front of them, which rose up as they approached it, the sound echoing through the caves. They made their way over the steel catwalk, the way illuminated by the orangish glow of the magma beneath their feet. Unlike the surface, the monsters down here were strange creatures, obviously not normal. It seemed like they were mutated versions of normal animals on the planets, but she had no idea what could have caused such drastic mutations. Some of them even had Photon scythes as parts of their appendages, which was a complete shock to Rico. They had managed to harness Photons as weapons, but these animals actually had Photons as natural body parts. Scientifically, it would be near impossible unless the animals were engineered with them…
Unless Pioneer 1 worked on something like that… Dr. Osto's a genius in genetic engineering. Did he have something to do with all this?
She glanced up as they stepped onto a long steel platform that spanned from wall to wall, the area beneath them filled with magma, rivers of it flowing in from cracks in the cavern wall. The altered beasts that inhabited the room turned to face them, letting out deep hisses. The Evil Sharks were bipedal, green, shark-like mutants with three yellow eyes along both sides of its head, a fin rising from the back of its head, and Photon scythes for arms. Pal Sharks were a dark purple color, while Guil Sharks were a good bit larger than their weaker brethren that were a mix of orange and purple coloring with yellow Photon scythes. About five of the Evil Sharks and one Guil Shark were in the room, two Poison Lilies just behind them. The Poison Lily was essentially an overgrown flower with three white-petals and a yellow mouth filled with deadly teeth in the middle. The mutant plants could spit out potent venom at their enemies from a distance, but it thankfully didn't go too far. Danielle was usually able to take them out with her Handgun while standing just out of range of their attacks. Rico had learned the hard way that if you got too close while they were weak, they would let out a screech that could completely paralyze someone… Only once had they encountered a red-petal Nar Lily, a more dangerous version of it with even more powerful poison.
Danielle raised her Handgun, trying to breath evenly as she took aim at the approaching Sharks beside Rico. "Same way as before?"
Red Saber humming softly, Rico readied the weapon. "Of course. Try not to get poisoned this time."
Danielle cringed slightly, but then nodded. "Right. Sure thing." She squeezed off shots as Rico charged in, the Photon bullets whizzing a few feet past her head and slamming into the Sharks. The Guil Shark swung vertically at her, but Rico sidestepped with ease, bringing her Red Saber up and searing through its arm. It let out a hiss of pain before she spun and plunged the weapon deep into its side, ripping the Photon blade out and cutting into an Evil Shark in the same motion. She heard one come up behind her, its hiss sounding in her ear, but she also heard the sound of Photon bullets slamming into flesh. She glanced over her shoulder as an Evil Shark behind her sank to the ground, Danielle aiming at it. Two of the Evil Sharks that had gone after her were lying motionless on the steel floor, the final one drawing close. Rico watched as Danielle ducked and sidestepped a strike from it, firing right at its face and taking it out.
Heh… She's getting better.
"Rico, watch it!" As soon as Rico heard the warning, she stepped to the right, avoiding a poisonous glob that the Poison Lily behind her had launched. Cursing herself for her carelessness, she rushed in and sliced right through its stem, killing it in one blow while Danielle sniped the second one from a distance. Beyond the middle of the room, it looked all-clear, no monster in sight.
"Uh, Rico, do you hear flapping?" Danielle asked now, walking over to her.
Rico raised an eyebrow now. Flapping? She lifted up her head, straining to hear over the sound of the flows of magma, pushing up her glasses a bit. Yes… Now that she thought about it, she did hear flapping. She glanced around, blinking rapidly as a shadow passed over them. What looked to be a dark blue with tan patches of skin on its back dragon flew over them before landing on the platform. It walked on two legs, its long leathery wings a tan color, its sky blue eyes staring right at them from beneath its horizontal horns. The beast, a Nano Dragon, used its small hands on the ends of the wing to grab the floor as blue energy filled its mouth.
"Oh shoot!" Rico grabbed Danielle and pulled her aside just as a piercing beam of blue energy tore through where they had just stood, searing the very air it passed through with an audible hiss. Rico glanced back at the beam as it slammed into the floor a few feet behind them before looking back at the Nano Dragon, rushing forward. It was starting to rise into the air, but she managed to get her Red Saber up and slash slightly into its underside before it got too high. The Nano Dragon roared in pain, staggering a bit before ascending into the air, glaring down at them. It was about to fly off when green Photon bullets pierced into its skull, the Nano Dragon letting out a final cry before falling to the floor and crashing into the steel.
Danielle stepped forward, still cautiously aiming her Handgun at it. "Geeze… This place is just full of surprises…" she murmured. "Dragons, walking sharks, living flowers… What's next?"
"I'm not too sure I want to find out." Rico shook her head slightly, looking up towards the now-unlocked door before them. What else would be waiting for them deep within the caves?
I'm not sure… but chances are we're going to find out whether we like it or not.
--
Danielle splashed the cool water on her face, feeling relaxed and a lot more awake as she cooled herself off and washed most of the grime from her face. Rico did the same, kneeling beside her, her glasses resting on the rocky ground at her side. They had been lucky that the caverns had gone from being filled with magma to cooler, sometimes open-aired areas that were mostly filled with water. Above them, the sun shone down through an opening in the cave ceiling, the fresh air definitely as refreshing as the water.
She glanced over sideways at Rico now, the hunter's eyes flickering around constantly even as she rested, watching for any enemies that may take the chance to attack them while their guard was down. Danielle watched her for a bit before looking back up at the blue sky above, her thoughts drifting to Pioneer 2. Would they be sending people down to the surface to look for survivors yet? And if so, would they find the caves like Rico and she had done and catch up with them?
"Danielle?" Danielle looked over at Rico now, who had slipped her glasses back on. "You're thinking about them, aren't you?"
"That obvious, huh?"
Rico nodded a bit, rising to her feet. "Yeah, it's okay to wonder if they'll come, but think about it too much and you'll lose the will to go on, instead waiting and waiting for someone to arrive when they may not."
Danielle couldn't help but frown a bit, the expression in Rico's eyes unreadable. "That's pretty harsh."
Rico just shrugged it off. "It's just logical thinking. I can tell that you want to stay and wait, that you think they'll come soon. But we may never know when they'll come. We need to keep moving, try to find another way to the surface deeper in."
Danielle glanced up at Rico now, who was holding an outstretched hand to Danielle. She paused, staring at the hunter's hand as she turned her words over in her mind. Yeah, she did want to stay here and wait… but Rico did have a point. She reached up and took her friend's hand, getting to her feet with Rico's help. "Alright. I'll try not to think about it too much."
Rico gave her an encouraging smile, but Danielle could tell that behind that mask of determination, she was also worried about if someone was coming after them or not. Rico looked forward once more, striding through a door while Danielle trailed after her, wondering why Rico tried to hide her feelings.
She's trying to be strong for me.
Danielle looked up slightly as the light dimmed considerably, the two of them stepping back into the enclosed sections of the caves, the water up to their ankles. The first thing she noticed was another of the altered beasts right in front of them, this one a Grass Assassin. The Grass Assassins were essentially overgrown mantises about eight to nine feet tall with a light blue exoskeleton, a single large purple eye with four smaller purple eyes around it just above its silk-producing mandibles, and two very long light purple Photon scythes on its two front arms. She knew how tough they were. They took a good bit of hits, and once they tied a person's legs with silk, it was nearly impossible to get free. She had learned that the hard way.
Danielle strafed to the right, firing multiple bullets at the Grass Assassin, trying to get into its blind spot on the right while Rico did the same going left. They turned very slowly, so constantly circling it gave them a pretty good advantage. She took careful aim with the Handgun, being careful not to hit Rico while she struck with the Red Daggers she had taken in her hands. The Grass Assassin dripped green blood from gashes in its exoskeleton as it kept trying to turn to face Rico, who always kept in its blind spot. Finally giving up, it just started for Danielle, but she was backing away while firing shots towards its head. A lucky shot hit its middle eye, and the creature hissed in pain, swinging wildly with one of its arms. Danielle lowered her Handgun, watching Rico swap the Red Daggers for her massive Red Sword, going in for a finishing blow. A single slash to the weakened part of its exoskeleton finished off the weakened Grass Assassin, and it let out a final squeal before falling to the ground with a splash.
"You know, after fighting these things a couple of times, you figure out just how to beat them easily…" Danielle commented, glancing around the room now. "It's just--" She stopped now, spotting a monument in the middle of the room. She wondered how she had missed seeing it when she first walked in, but the thought quickly vanished as she walked towards it. "Hey Rico, they have one of these things down here, too?"
Rico joined her at the monument, examining it with interest. "Apparently… There's no way that Pioneer 1 could have built this. They said the one in the forest was to commemorate the landfall, but if so, why is there one down here, too? Maybe an ancient civilization did exist on Ragol." There was a slightly excited look in her eyes as she slowly circled the monument, thoroughly examining it. "It's odd, though. The monument in the forest was activated when I found you, but this one isn't."
Danielle stared at the dull brown surface of the monument, recalling what had happened in the forest when she had found the monument. "It wasn't activated at first," she spoke slowly. "I touched it with my hand, and then it started glowing…" She stepped forward, slowly lifting her hand to trace the weathered engravings on the surface. The entire thing lit up now, runes glowing with that strange golden light, the circular symbol at the top glowing blue instead of red. Danielle felt a chill spread through her, more powerful than when she was in the forest, the voice that whispered in her head a bit stronger now. Something called to her, called to her from below…
She pulled her hand away, the strange feeling going away now. Danielle quickly tried to shake it off, not letting Rico see the fright in her eyes. Thankfully, the hunter was too busy trying to decode the symbols, inputting data into her arm unit while pulling out another message capsule from her storage. Danielle just wandered around the room now, wading through the ankle-deep water that felt pretty cold, but not as cold as the chill that had been in her body. "Danielle, you okay?"
Danielle blinked rapidly, realizing she had spaced out for a bit. "Uh, yeah," she answered, looking over her shoulder at Rico. "You're done?"
"Yeah, but I couldn't decipher the characters. Not enough samples of it." Rico looked down at her arm unit, eyes narrowing now as she stared at something on the screen. "We've got trouble. Behind us."
Danielle spun around and snapped up her Handgun, but nothing was there. "Huh…?" She paused, feeling something slide by her leg, something colder and thicker than the water. She looked down at her feet, but all she saw was clear blue water. "What the heck…?"
"Danielle, they're Pofuilly Slimes! Watch—Aah!" Rico suddenly cried out in pain, and Danielle spun to see a creature composed of blue slime. Its eye looked like a red visor across its face. A tendril of slime rose from the water a few feet in front of it, the slime having gone through the very ground itself, and ended in a blood red blade that was dug into the hunter's leg. Danielle raised her Handgun to fire when something cold and wet wrapped tightly around her neck, pulling her down and making her fall to the ground on her back. The water covered her face, going up her nose as she flailed against the tendril. The Pofuilly Slime that had come up from behind was trying to drown her while its kin kept Rico occupied. She could now feeling something slimy on her legs, creeping over her body slowly, a burning sensation sinking in where the slime touched. Her left hand pulled at the slimy tendril as her lungs burned from her holding her breath, the Handgun still gripped in her right hand. She fired rapidly at the blue shape she could barely make out a few feet from her, barely able to hear the hiss of pain from the Pofuilly Slime that she had apparently hit. There was another hiss now, louder this time, and Danielle was pulled upright just as she couldn't hold her breath anymore. Danielle gasped, taking in the warm, stale air of the cave. She rubbed her neck where the tendril had been, the skin irritated, seeing now that both of the creatures were gone without a trace.
"That was close…" Rico said between gasps. "I've never seen… anything like that." She used a Monomate healing item in a small container to heal her leg, the deep gash closing up. Danielle nodded shakily, still sitting in the water as she brushed a strand of wet hair out of her face, taking Rico's now-outstretched hand and rising to her feet. "Are you okay? I tried to get to you as fast as I could."
"I think so. Really cold, and my neck and legs hurt…" She wrung out her shirt as best as she could, shivering while Rico checked her legs and her neck.
"That slime must have something in it that's acidic to skin, but thankfully it didn't do too much damage… You should be okay." There was a relieved look on her eyes as she stepped back, nodding to Danielle. She turned towards the other door now, her Red Saber held at the ready.
Danielle walked after her now, frowning. Creatures like what they had been facing off against were definitely not normal. There was no way they were just average animals. Rico had called them altered beasts… "What… What if we run into whatever caused the mutations of these monsters?"
Rico paused, a thoughtful look on her face. "Why do you think something in particular caused the mutations?" she asked over her shoulder, although it was obvious she was thinking about the same thing.
"I'm not sure. I mean, you said these things looked like mutations of the normal animals, right? Something had to have caused it. What if it's something that's around here?" Danielle followed Rico through another door, relieved to see that the scenery was beginning to change. "Of course, it's probably just a wild guess…"
Rico shook her head. "You're too critical of yourself, you know that? These things had to have been changed, but there's no telling by what. The government could have been experimenting with something and using these as subjects, but I doubt they purposely made them in such large numbers… We'll just have to wait and see what we find."
Danielle looked up at Rico now, hesitating before nodding, continuing beside her friend. Not for the first time, she wondered just what it was that they were digging up.
--
Rico sidestepped the red beam of energy that cut through the air, feeling the wave of heat coming from it. The creature that had launched it was a four legged, two-armed beast called Pan Arms. It was actually a pair of monsters joined together, the one of the left a blue color with an arm on its left side. The creature on the right was a tan color, its arm on the right. While they were joined together, their physical defense was nearly impossible to penetrate. She watched the conjoined creatures carefully as they began to maneuver around, the green holes on its front side facing Danielle now. Rico was tempted to use an attack technique on it, but decided against it. She would need to save her strength for whenever Resta was needed.
Danielle jumped back to avoid the spray of blue energy, panting a bit. The Pan Arms finally decided to split up to attack them, roaring and stomping the ground, splitting into Hidoom and Migium, yellow and purple Photon blades extending from their claws respectively. They moved a lot quicker now, and Rico was forced to go on the defensive as the Hidoom's blade lunged at her. She parried the strike with her Red Saber, hearing Danielle's Handgun firing off rapid shots as she yelped in surprise. Rico glanced over at her, the Migium's blade barely missing Danielle's head, the teen's eyes wide. She aimed the Handgun right at its face, firing at its red eyes. With a strange moan it fell backwards to the ground, the Hidoom turning to look at its fallen twin. Taking advantage of this, Rico impaled her Red Saber deep into its back, eyes narrowing. "Time to join your brother," she murmured, ripping out the blade sideways and putting it out of its misery.
"I know I've said this about nearly ever single one we killed, but what the heck was this thing?" Danielle muttered, wiping sweat from her forehead.
Rico frowned. "Just another bit of mutated wildlife, I guess. We can only hurt it when it's separated."
"Geeze… Giant bugs, walking sharks, poison-spitting flowers, and now conjoined twin monsters with Photon swords in their arms? What's next?"
"I don't think I want to know." Rico sighed, rubbing her eyes a bit with her free hand before she lead the way once more. This entire section of the caves was filled with even more of Pioneer 1's technology. The pathways, catwalks, generators were all built by them. But what were they doing so far from the Central Dome? That was something she hadn't figured out just yet. Her feet clanged against the metal catwalk they passed over, water visible beneath them. She paused to glance through a door to their left that opened as they came within range, noticing it was a storage area filled with white boxes. This was the first storage area she had even managed to find in the caves, but she didn't hesitate to check them out. The boxes shattered as the Photon blade of the Red Saber cut into them, the orange and blue storage boxes that held weapons and armor spilling out. These were things Danielle seriously needed right now. "Let's get you outfitted with this gear. With how tough they've been getting, you need some protection," Rico said over her shoulder, opening one of the blue boxes that contained a lightweight, basic frame. Danielle pulled off her vest, slipping the frame over her shirt before pulling the vest back on. Rico slipped the storage unit on her left arm, attaching a Flame Barrier unit to it. "You know how to use arm units, right?"
"Uh-huh. I watched another hunter do it once." She looked down at the weapon boxes on the floor, checking through each of them and storing a saber-type weapon with a blue blade, a Brand, a rifle with a blue Photon core, a Sniper, and a few technique disks. She swapped her Handgun for an Autogun, its Photon charge blue instead of green. She nodded when she was ready, going over the technique disks she had picked up.
Foie, a fireball technique, Resta, the ice technique Barta and the lightning technique Zonde… All the basic techniques. She'll definitely need those.
Rico stopped, her gaze falling on a console beside a locked door that was different from the others they had seen. It wasn't as tall, a good bit wider than the others. With a slight frown, Rico tried to open the door with its control panel, but a red "Access Denied" message flashed across the screen. "Great. It's locked, and I don't have the clearance to open it," she muttered with a frustrated sigh.
"Um, maybe I can," Danielle said quietly. "I did manage to get the door in that cavern open while the dragon was attacking us."
Rico raised an eyebrow now as Danielle went over to the controls, an intent look on the teen's face. "This is a government computer, though. The one in that cavern probably had a lot less protection on it than this one, so I doubt it will be so easy to get in to—" The sound of the door opening cut her off, a surprised look on her face.
Danielle wore a bit of a smirk on her face now, her young eyes filled with amusement.. "You were saying?"
Rico couldn't help but laugh a bit. "Well, guess I learned the hard way not to doubt your talent with computers. You ready to go?"
Danielle nodded, taking her Sniper from her storage unit now. She looked a bit surprised by the increased weight, but she seemed to adjust quickly to it. Rico waited for her to nod that she was ready, looking towards the now-open door and the dock beyond it. Preparing herself for whatever waited ahead, Rico stepped through the doorway.