Rowdy Dead Productions

By David C. Daoust

 

One minute, Colin Vice was trudging along, arms pinned by the vice-like grip of the serpentine construct that currently forced him to march forward. The next, he was trying to track, what he could swear, was an inky black shadow… It first appeared as the pair crossed a cross section of the mazelike lower corridors of the Crucible.

Just momentarily, he saw the dark form from the corner of his eye. It vanished before he could turn his head to get a bead on it. It was such a quick flash, that chills ran down his spine when he turned his head forward again, to spot the same inky black shadow charging directly at him. Part of him wanted to drop down, roll out of the way. Though considering he was still locked in the red constructs grip- he didn’t really have that choice.

Arms pinned, there was not much he could do but tense up.

The shadow was upon them in a matter of seconds. It leapt over Colin completely, landed on the construct. The sound of scraping metal could be heard, reverberating, through the surrounding corridors.

The strangely human voice of the red construct, cried out in surprise as it did what it could to defend against the surprise attack.

Colin flexed tight as his arms were twisted to nearly bone breaking angles. He was lifted up into the air as the shadow forced the robot back. The red constructs grip dug deeper into his flesh, tighter, his arms bowed back as the construct’s other two arms flung up to fend off, what Colin suddenly recognized as a hound.

A hound made up of pure shadow, with glowing purple eyes– its edges seemed to curl with a shadowy flame. It currently clamped its jaw at the metal neck, paws flailing to find purchase upon the massive snake-like machine. It struggled as much with maintaining balance as it did its attack…

Colin recognized the beast immediately. It belonged to one Gordon Hitch, the solid-light engineer that had created it. The ‘beast’ was, in fact, a bot-form with a low caliber data-sphere cradled within a solid-light lattice. A lattice similar to Colin’s own solid-light form, that he used when he was out on missions. Currently, of course, Colin was within his normal human body– a fact he regretted as he found himself flung about like a ragdoll in the middle of a robot fight. An experience that was sure to make him doubt the shadow-hounds strategy…

The hound, as though it realized its folly, suddenly spun from his assault on the constructs head and neck, and instead, began to rend one of the arms, that held Colin tight, with its powerful jaw.

The force of violence that followed was bewildering as the red construct seemed to turn the tides, sent a flurry of blows upon the Shadow-hound’s head. Like a jack-hammer, perfectly aligned, each blow followed the next with a blinding speed… An attack that, in point of fact, managed to drill the solid-light maw, directly through the arm it held in its grip!

Had Colin been a normal man, he was sure, his bones would be powder. As it were, he was just rip-roaring sore as the shadow-maw managed rip one of the arms, pinning him, free of the constructs body.

The blunder did not stop there, no sooner had Colin remembered that there had been two such hounds, than the other leapt into the fray from behind. It moved with blinding speed, jaws gripping the other arm…

It all happened pretty fast, but as soon as one arm broke free, the robot turned, and committed the exact same attack on the next hound, jackhammering the solid-light maw through the next arm.

Before Colin knew it, he had spilled to the ground, both of the robot’s arms still locked on his, though torn completely free of the red constructs body.

The snake-bot-thing, finally free of the ambush, stood triumphantly only for a moment before it seemed to realize he was down two arms… and one prisoner. It presented the two broken nubs, sparking before him.

“Don’t really think things through, very well, do you?” Colin asked, remembering what it had said when it had powered back up in that cell.

“Well, I am a bit new at this…” it answered back, the grimace could be heard in its voice as the two remaining arms suddenly transformed into two long, sword-like, blades.

The two hounds, holding themselves between their rescued prisoner and the jailor, snarled from the ground, as the new threat presented itself. No sooner had the two shadow-hounds lunged with a renewed assault, than Colin heard a call from behind.

“Psst,” the voice could be heard like a loud whisper, “Come’ere.”

Colin searched the corridor behind him as the battle raged before him. He saw the head peaking around the next cross section. The golden blonde locks, in the low light, told of Gordon Hitch, himself, come to rescue him.

“Quick, quick,” Gordon, urgently, dared revealing himself in the corridor more as he spoke a bit loader, “We got to blow it!”

Those words sank into Colin’s head pretty quick… Suddenly, doubted Gordon’s strategy as much as he doubted that first hound! Especially with the image of that red construct, ripping off his own arms, so fresh in his mind.

“You can’t ‘blow things up’ on a space-station,” Colin seethed as he rushed to the solid-light engineer, searching for a way to stop whatever he might have planned, “You can’t risk the hull!”

“I know that!” Hitch retorted as he lifted the long lance-like device he held, “You think I don’t know that?”

“Well… wait!” Colin exclaimed as he watched the man aim the ‘device’ like a weapon– on one shoulder, like a missile-launcher, in point of fact. Though before Colin could successfully halt the man, the golden-haired scientist let out a shrill whistle, calling off his dogs.

The hounds were fast, really fast, though probably not faster than serpentine snake-bot-thing. That is, if the serpentine snake-bot-thing had been ready to react to the sudden signal as quickly.

Colin was pretty sure it was a dope anyway.

No sooner had the dogs arrived next to them, then Hitch shot the device with kind of a punch-like noise; more like a potato-gun, than the missile-launcher it was held as.

A small ball flew at the dumb-founded, dim-witted construct, before the ball suddenly ‘exploded’ with an unusual ‘sconch’ sound that heralded the disappearance of the corridor as a whole, as it was suddenly clogged with what appeared, at first, like a massive wall of foam.

The wall stopped but inches from their position.

Colin held a hand out to touch it, it felt like cement!

“Ooooh,” Gordon’s eyes were huge as he examined how close the wall had come to enveloping them. He glanced back at Colin with a silent ‘whoa!’

“That was a bit tighter than expected,” he admitted guiltily.

Colin did not want to know what would have happened, had they been caught within the forming substance!