down the dark hall-way from whence Jin-Lao had come, that Portly was shaking with fear. It might have been funny if I wasn’t shaking too.
The beam from my flashlight cut through the darkness like a knife. I had purposely decided not to switch to N.V.G.s for two reasons. Since conventional Night Vision Goggles amplified ambient light, if the power were to be somehow restored, by the techs working at poolside, I would be temporarily flash blinded the moment it came back on. And that would not be good if at that time I happened to be face to face with whatever killed Jin-Lao. And two: ‘it’ seemed to be avoiding even the dimly lit areas. So maybe it was afraid of the light. If ‘it’ was; then the light was my friend. Or maybe I was just afraid to be in the dark.
With measured steps, I slowly made my way down the winding hall-way, traversing my weapon left to right. The configuration of Gossamer Muse made it easy for passengers to find their way around since the main entertainment and recreation decks were located between the passenger decks. But it also made it difficult to search deck by deck since all 29 of Schindler elevators on board the vessel were off-line. The layout also provided many ambush points and hiding places for potential threats, especially in the dark.
I entered a large partially lit area. It was the central boarding area. I swept the interior with the point of my assault rifle. Before me stood a majestic nine-deck atrium which offered a view up through a massive skylight to the morning light on deck 14. Large blue/green glass walls and windows stylishly separated the decks surrounding up the atrium’s length. The atrium was dominated by a five deck high lalique-style water sculpture, of a tastefully unclothed nymph pouring a vase of water, which served as a backdrop for the main stair-case that branched off to the upper decks on opposing sides of the lobby. Off to the right, there was a two deck tall water-fall and a stage built for a small orchestra that would welcome passengers aboard. When they built the Gossamer Muse it was obvious they spared no expense. I was so caught up in gawking at the ship’s architecture that I forgot why I was here until I tripped over what I thought was luggage left at the foot of the stair-case. Stupid.
As I got to my feet my light passed on the errant luggage. It was Tan. Point of fact it was Tan’s life-less body sans his head. In a panic I scrambled backwards on my ass away from corpse. Quickly regaining my composure I got to my feet, shouldered my assault-rifle and started scanning the lobby for Tan and Jin-Lao’s murderer. A scraping sound came from the landing half-way up the lavish stair-case.
As the beam of my gun-mounted flash-light slowly ran the length of the stair an area of red carpet near the top of stair rippled like heat off a tin roof on a hot summer day. The ripple moved down the stairs towards me and stopped.
The ripple diffused to reveal a grey and white pock-marked insect-like crustacean the size of a small horse. It looked like a finned crab with six dangerous looking spider-like legs that pierced the floor of the stair-case as it moved. The creature had two mean metre long crab-claws and huge horizontal mandibles protruded from, what I assumed was, the base of its head. As if that wasn’t enough it had two segmented scorpion-like tails that hung menacingly over its shell-armored body. It let out a loud gurgling hiss.
I squeezed the trigger of my OICWv2. The three rounds of semi automatic fire hit their mark.
The creature leapt over the side of the stair-case and made for the waterfall. It was trying to out-flank me! The color of it shell changed constantly as it moved from shadowed to lit areas. It was unbelievably fast for something so big.
I switched the selector on my assault-rifle to ‘full- auto.’
The creature leapt up onto the wall. Its two tails streamed behind it like ribbons on a little girl’s bicycle as it ran along the walls.
I let loose with everything that was left in the forty round magazine. The reflection of the muzzle flashes of my OICWv2 lit up the darkened lobby as shattered glass from the enormous atrium cascaded noisily into the lobby floor like a crystal waterfall.
It leapt from the wall and charged at me.
I thumbed the selector again and fired off seven of eight 16mm explosive shells at the creature. The motion sensitive laser mounted on the gun-sight had locked on to the creature. One by one, the seven explosive shells swooped after their target. And one by, one they exploded sequentially behind the fast moving creature until the last round hit it square on.
It went down.
There was glass everywhere. The part of the atrium was shattered and the water-sculpture totally destroyed along with part of the upper stair-case and sections of the floor. A thin veil of smoke wafted through the lobby. The fire-sprinklers had been set off and were bathing the entire lobby with salt water.
The creature laid on the ground it writhing slowly. A portion of its hard exterior shell had been smashed opened by a 16mm explosive round. It seemed to bleed a black viscous liquid.
I re-loaded my weapon. Soaking wet I approached the dying creature and emptied my weapon on it. Again. Just in case…
Suddenly, there were foot-steps on the stairs behind me. I immediately turned, shouldered my weapon and searched for the source of the noise. The beam of my flashlight tracked the stair. Nothing. The foot-steps suddenly stopped at the bottom of the stair near Tan’s body with a sick wet thud. The beam of light fell upon its intended target. The source of noise: It was his head. Or what was left of it.
From the top of the staircase came a, now familiar, loud gurgling hiss.
Instinctively, I raised my rifle and fired my last explosive round. The creature didn’t have time to move. It didn’t need to…..
….I missed.
Chapter 6
April 20th 2021
0655 hours
Gossamer Muse Super Cruise-liner
Deck Seven, Main Atrium lobby-level
The creature hissed and whipped its two tails forward. Two spikes like the one that killed Jin-Lao flew at me. I barely managed to duck one while the other struck and lodged itself firmly into the side of my OICWv2 which I had instinctively used as a shield. The creature hissed angrily and charged down the stair. I dropped my now damaged assault rifle and ran for my life.
Outside the sun had come up so the hallways weren’t as pitch-black dark as they had been when we first arrived. It could have been that my eyes had adjusted to the dark or that I was just scared out of my mind but as I ran down the winding hallways at full sprint I had no trouble seeing my way. Neither did the creature at my heels. As I rounded a bend I could see Portly standing at the door-way, where I had left him, with his Chinese M4A1 assault rifle.
“Good-old, Portland,” I thought as I ran to him. That was until he raised the rifle and aimed right at me. It was then I realized the son-of-a-bitch had his eyes shut tightly. The multiple barrels of the M4A1 roared to life flashed angrily as they spun at 8000 RPM.
Time, technology and Chinese genius had overcome the weight, complexity and external power issues that had prevented the earlier creation of effective usable single-operator mini-guns on the modern battle-field. The M4A1 Ultra-lite triple pulse assault rifle was a five barreled hydraulic operated mini-gun that could fire three thousand five hundred 5.56mm rounds a minute from two cylindrical magazines, one in the stock; the other just after the gun’s fore-grip. A monster of an assault rifle originally
