Darkness Falls

[Neo Shark]

With a startled oath Phedre begins to back away from the infected crew member. The flares in her hands fall from her limp fingers and roll away from her. Now that he was completely illuminated the full horror of his predicament was apparent to all. As waves of disgust roll over her she continues to back away, out of the Sergeants line of fire. Now that the crew members usefulness was at an end Phedre began considering other options.

"Put him out of his misery, would you please?"

With the loss of this information source they would need to find another. The most likely suspect would the bridge. There they could hopefully access the logs and find out what the heck happened here. Pulling a new pair of flares to replace the ones lost, she turns to address the others.

"We should check the bridge next. We should find our answers there."

 

[Vayna Akhara]

Taia aimed at the twitching droch victim and fired the flamethrower, engulfing him in superheated fire. The flesh crisped and cracked in the intense heat, the body jerked and slumped, lying still as the flesh turned brown then black as it carbonised. The blonde continued to play the flamethrower over the corpse from head to foot until it was alight from top to bottom.

She finally stepped back, looking at the shrivelled, nearly mummified corpse, blackened and smoking, barely recognisable as once having been human. A haze of smoke rose from the body as it lay burning and smouldering. Eyes narrowed, Taia looked around.

Droch are attracted to heat. This may catch their attention ...

"Get ready; droch may be coming."

 

[DeathToll]

A scurring, a scattering, crawled disturbingly all through the walls; seeing nothing, yet hearing everything. The clicking and tapping of little insect legs sounded as several groups scurried through the walls and huddled around the bodie as close as possible. There would be no doubts now. They had truly infested the workings of this ship, moving freely through the hollowed walls, the ceilings, and the floors. They couldn't get to the body. The sounds stopped.

 

[HunterOrdo]

Disgusting worm. It carried the small creatures inside of it as it crawled around beneath his flesh. He wondered what it must have felt like.. to know that you were not going to die as the insects needed you. You could feel them slowly biting.. gnawing on your insides crawling around, but you could not stop them. No one could stop them. A fitting end for a worm. If he had been alone, Mordred would have left the worm. Being devoured from within.. marvelous.

He listened quietly as his two companions spoke to one another. Yes, the Bridge. The reason why they had come. It was not to kill the insects, merely to get the logs. A shame. They burned the worm.. he could hear the insects inside the worms body scream through the force from the pain.. or perhaps it was the worm himself, who knew.

Taia had an interesting theory. Fire would attract them..? He thought they hated light, and most light gave off heat, but sure enough they swarmed through the holes of the ship. Had they dug those themselves? If so their armor that he and his companions were wearing would not last long should they get on us.

They were running around in the walls, it was hard no to hear them and then nothing. Either they had come because of the heat, to see if any of the worm was salvageable.. or to get them. Perhaps it was all of it. ".. Should we flee for the bridge?" Mordred asked his companions.

 

[Vayna Akhara]

The sounds of the insect swarms echoing through the ship was one to make the hairs on the back of one's neck stand up. Taia looked around to see if they were breaking through into the room they were currently in. but as yet they had no way of reaching the three explorers.

"The Bridge sounds a good idea; we can get the information we came for and get out, vapourise the ship when we leave to destroy the droch so they can't infect any more ships. Let's go; use your flares to keep them at bay. Tell me if you see a swarm; I can incinerate them with the flamethrower."

She oriented her self towards the front of the ship, found the door that would open onto a corridor leading forward, and pointed her flamethrower at the door.

"One of you open the door and get back, quickly."

 

[DeathToll]

A swarm of matured Droch sat gathered upon the wall in darkness across the hall, the first thing that would be seen once the doors were opened.