End Boss

by Bryan Nyaude

  “Just hold out until Jan is done,” Cathy yelled to me and retracted her body back for another attack at the soldiers. “Get ready, here they come.”

  Something was odd. The enemy had changed stance and were attacking in brief and short intervals, in pairs. Somehow, they were telepathically communicating and coordinating their attacks, giving us no room to breathe at all. I took out some armor disruptors from my bag and threw them at one of them. His armor short circuited after a few seconds and he fell on the ground, barely able to move. The rest of them were able to evade the disruptors easily and attack me inexorably.

  “This is irritating,” I commented, roughly, and descended towards the floor.

  I wasn’t getting anywhere by attacking in the air. The moment my feet touched the ground, I removed a metal disruptor short sword and stood between Jan and the soldiers. Odds were really bad, my best chance of winning lay in attacking randomly without strategy. Considering their brains were linked, this plan would work. Man, of all the places to be stuck in the universe, it just had to be an alien, infested planet, didn’t it?

  I tensed my body and rotated my head horizontally at each of my opponents. They looked fierce and rather intimidating; none of them moved a muscle or even blinked. Eyes dark and powerful like black daggers, I freaked out a little. Not scared, but freaked. I heard a rough noise and turned my head towards the sound. One of the soldiers had jolted first without warning, coming at me with a baton like stuff. It emitted strange electric energy, glowing blue in color. He swung sideways in a wild manner, aiming for my head, and by some fortunate chance, he narrowly missed me—rotating his arm to attack again. This time, I got closer and reduced the impact of his attack by gripping his arm tightly. Without giving him any chance to get free, I struck first with my dagger and cut a piece off his chest armor. The others watched silently, observing my attack pattern. What were they waiting for? Honestly, I wasn’t complaining, it was easier for me this way. Out of the blue, two more came towards me, forcing me to move back a few steps. Warning signs started to pop up on my helmet screen, showing me the damage stats. The armor was still holding strong; however, it wouldn’t last, not against a powerful enemy as this. A strange explosion erupted, creating confusion amongst the alien soldiers. Each of them reacted the same way, distracting them away from me. Yes, I used this to my advantage to distance myself from them and rest for a bit, before they attacked again. Apparently, they reacted badly to high explosive attacks. Or so I thought: worth the risk. I dug into my weapons satchel and found small dud grenades, about six of them. I needed more than this. They weren’t enough, but I had to make them work to my advantage somehow.

  “Try not to kill them,” Cathy said, seeing the dud grenades in my hand.

  “So, now you tell me?” I growled at her; it was easier said than done.

  They were trying to kill me with everything they had. It was not going to be easy to keep them back. “Why shouldn’t I kill them?” I asked as I backed away. Their attention had reverted back to me.

  “Because they are still my people, they are just under hypnosis,” she said and punched one of the soldiers so hard, he smashed head first in a wall.

  Really now! So, I couldn’t kill them, but she could?

  “I’m almost done,” Jan yelled at us and gave us a hand signal, “I should be able to shut it down from here.”

  “Great, just hurry.” Cathy said.

  He still wasn’t done, meaning I had to buy him some more time. Rather hard since these guys were no easy picnic. I couldn’t help this feeling in my heart, this feeling of fear and doubt that kept latching onto me. Could we really survive this? To be specific, could I survive this? Cathy looked like she could handle her own, even against this many.

  “Cathy, I want you to take Jan and get out of here,” I said trembling in fear.

  Darn! I had no idea why I said that but I had. “I have a plan and I will be right behind you.” Crap! I had no plan, and for some unknown reason, I was just blurting out things I really didn’t mean at all. Stupid me as usual, doing things beyond my pay scale.

  “What are you planning to do?” Cathy asked, looking at me with such curious eyes.

  This was my chance to really act brave and impress her enough to forget what I had done in the past. For some reason, I just wanted her to change her opinion about me, and maybe not backstab me in the end.

  “That’s crazy, just keep firing and we will get out of this together,” she said and fired a few more rounds at the soldiers.

  “No, we can’t,” I said in a frustrated voice that did not sound like me. “Remember when you asked me if I had anything worth fighting for? Well, now, I have. I want you to take Jan and leave this place immediately.”

  Great! I was trembling in my boots, barely able to hold back my fear; however, I had to act tough for them and for the sake of the mission. Cathy halted her attack as she looked at me in wonder. She probably knew I was up to something and she wanted to figure it out.

  “I’m done,” Jan said, rising up quickly.

  Before he could come to us, a stray bullet caught him in the leg. He wimped in pain, as he fell to the ground. There was a slight fume odor oozing out of his injured leg.

  “No, Jan,” Cathy screamed and dashed towards him.

  It was bad, nevertheless he would survive, provided he got immediate medical attention. The mindless soldiers stopped moving, watching us constantly. I took a few steps back and moved towards Cathy and Jan—my eyes glued towards our enemy. Definitely, couldn’t afford to take it easy, not around these guys. Still, it was good they were not attacking; it gave us time to think of a better escape strategy. Suddenly, they all leaped in to attack us at the same time. I twisted my body and rotated on my axis, kicking one of the guys with everything I had. He fell to the ground and twitched for a couple of seconds. That move didn’t stop the others from coming after me. I looked back and saw Cathy try to lift Jan up to his feet. She wasn’t even paying attention to her surroundings, meaning it was all up to me to defend them. I turned around again and saw two alien drone soldiers rush towards me. One swung from the bottom, while the other from above, coming from opposite directions. Realizing the danger, I swerved back and threw a few dud and real grenades onto their path. Completely single minded, they probably wouldn’t see my trap. Nothing happened; the grenades did not explode at all. Crap, not exactly what I intended to happen. I watched the two soldiers stop in their path, for a minute, before they launched their second attack. It was amazing how well they executed every move. Nothing was left to chance, and it felt like they had practiced these maneuvers for years on end. I ran out of their way and moved far, to the other side of the building.

  “I said go,” I yelled to Cathy, while leading the horde of soldiers away from them.

  She nodded and helped Jan up to flee. Before one of the soldiers could go towards them, I threw a few smoke canisters in their direction and blocked him from seeing which way they went. The plan worked smoothly. Cathy and Jan managed to escape without anyone chasing after them. Now all their attention was reverted towards me.

  Great! Now what? I had apparently left that important piece out of my strategy. I was completely trapped and surrounded by over 20 soldiers—not good at all.

  “You have no place to go,” they all spoke at the same time.

  True! There was no path left for me to escape out of this mess. This was probably my last stand alive. Surrendering was not an option in the matter, since there was more at stake than my life. I firmly gripped all my weapons and tensed my body hard. If this was my last stand, I was going to make them work for it. Plus, the others needed more time to escape and destroy the gate. However, right now, I needed some questions answered.

  “Where is the people you took from the large earth ship?” I asked.

  “You will see them soon enough after you surrender, you have no place to go,” one of them said.

  He was a big man and had many symbols on his armor, like he was
the general or higher. For some reason, he didn’t seem hypnotized like the others. I clenched tight on my gun and coiled my back, in retaliation. Surrendering was not an option. But he had confirmed what I needed to know. They were alive after all; my crew was here and I was going to find them.

  “Rick, they are here,” I said through my com link, which was now operational.

  I paused for a minute and took slow deep breaths to conserve some of my energy. I had probably burned off most of the glycogen in my system, meaning it was a matter of time before my body began to move sluggishly.

  “Don’t worry, Den,” Rick spoke back to me and I could now see his face through the com link. “We will find them.”

  I smiled as an idea came to my head. It was risky, but one that I could possibly execute.

  “Rick, I have a plan. You need to listen carefully,” I whispered my plan to him as my enemy looked closely at me without moving a muscle. “Please hurry, there isn’t enough time left.”

  He listened and went along with my plan, despite the doubt and fear in his voice. All that was left was to buy myself some time until Rick got to this location, using the ship.

  “Attack him now,” the general guy growled and all 20 soldiers moved, accordingly, with precision.

  Quickly, I switched the remaining power in my suit manually to my shield and created a force field around myself, to defend myself from attack. An EMP explosion rattled the ground as I pulled the trigger, quickly shutting down everything that ran on electricity. Oh crap! The soldiers’ systems did not go offline. Their armor was adapted to some other sort of power supply—like mine was. Great! My other plan had failed to work and now the enemy was going to attack relentlessly without mercy. Although, that little destruction had bought me enough time to make a hasty retreat, that was if I could.

  “Duck now,” Rick yelled from the com link.

  After hearing his voice, I ran towards the nearest solid block I could find and covered my head.

  “What are you doing?” they all said and laughed at me, infuriating me deeply.

  Stupid fools, I looked up and saw the biggest explosion I had ever seen before. It rattled everything, scorching the entire block into chaos and confusion. The blast was far much grander than what I expected. Perhaps, he had thrown too much of those destructive pellets which resulted in this explosion. I was hurled back and forth in the blaze of fire and my shields did nothing much to protect me from harm. Before I knew it, my head hit the wall so hard, I quickly lost consciousness and blanked out into darkness.

  9

  “What is it that you fight for?” a voice awakened me from my slumber. “What is it that you seek?”

  Oh great! Were we playing trivia now? I opened my eyes slowly into the darkness, and saw a small pond in front of me. It glowed with radiant, clear vivid water. Just what I needed, another weird and strange dream. I walked up to it and took a sip full of water. Funny thing was I couldn’t quench the thirst that still lurked within me, no matter how much I drank. What was this strong feeling of emptiness? I had never felt it before until now. It was like I was missing something very important; I just couldn’t remember what it was.

  “Tell me, what it is that you seek?” the voice asked again from the darkness, a strange chill of fear crept up my spine. “Why do you seek it, when you already have it?”

  Seriously! Was this some sort of a bad joke? I mean, if I already had what I was looking for, then was there a point in looking for it? Well, it didn’t matter, I had to get out of this place and join the others. It was so dark I couldn’t see a thing. No shade of light was present. This total darkness was maddening; I couldn’t find my way in it. All I could do was stay in one place, to not get lost.

  “Get me out of this thing,” I said out loud to whoever was doing this to me. “This joke is no longer funny, as you can see, I’m not laughing.”

  There was a deep, long silence, followed by a chilly blowing wind. I could feel totally nothing. So this was what true isolation felt like? It felt like crap. If I lost everything, this was what I had to look forward to.

  “I can’t get you out of here,” someone responded to me after a while, “this place is within your heart and only you can get yourself out of here.”

  Not this again, I was really getting tired of answers and questions that couldn’t be proved logically through science. How could this possibly be my heart? One cannot enter his own heart physically or mentally. If I told anyone about this, I would be locked in a mental asylum for at least a decade. I was trapped by the enemy, somewhere large and dark. That made more sense to me, but the only way to get out of this nightmare was to play along. I stood alone in the dark, thinking of everything I had done in the past and present. Yep, it was a whole lot of baggage dragging on my shoulders. Maybe, some time alone in the dark was what I really needed to get my act together. What am I saying? This didn’t make sense at all.

  “Stop joking, how do I get out of this place?” I screamed out of frustration. “I have somewhere to be and there are people who need me.”

  “Only you can get yourself out of this,” it said and faded out of my hearing.

  Great! I was expected to believe I was trapped inside my own heart. Rather not what I ever thought possible in my lifetime. This was seriously ruining my already messed up day. It was bad enough I stuck my neck into an alien civil war, but now this? The mere idea of solving this problem made my stomach turn. I shook my head, “No, I will get out of here and get back to the others.”

  Fatality was not acceptable, not at this point. I still had to find Rose, wherever she was—there was something I needed to ask her. It was important and I was going to wait to ask it when I found her. Yes, I refused to let it end like this, not without a fight. That being said, I was still stuck here with no sense of direction. The only way out was to play along with the silly charade of a game. “Okay, pretend this is your heart. You are inside your own heart.”

  With those thoughts in my mind, I took a deep breath and went into the depths of my heart. Okay, maybe, this was my heart, just saying I had to keep an open mind. And this darkness was the product of all my thoughts and actions to this day and age. If that was the case, all I had to do was forgive myself and clear my heart. Simple enough!

  “No, what was I saying?” I screamed at myself out loud. “Could I be really buying into this crap?”

  Calm down, it was all an illusion, a game of minds and all I had to do was think smarter. I don’t know how much time passed, but it seemed like eternity, as I gathered myself and cleared my mind of all my negative thoughts. The more I tried to put logic into the situation, the harder it was to figure the puzzle out: “So, no logic!”

  I felt something change suddenly. It was working; there was faint light around me. It was coming from above. I looked around and saw nothing around me—no walls, no ceiling, no latches, or tunnels. I’m sure this was all just a bad dream I would forget about later, but for now, I had to play along. Note to self: don’t tell anyone about this.

  Now what! A tunnel formed in front of me, horizontally, leading somewhere. I think this was my way out. Finally, I was going to leave this wretched place behind. Quickly, I ran towards it with all my might, forgetting all my restraints and doubt. The thought of it being another enemy trap skipped my mind. All I wanted was to get out and rejoin my allies. Before I could pass through it, I saw a door that said, “Rose” on it, halfway through the strange tunnel, glued on the left side.

  I stopped in my tracks and looked at it. Definitely caught by surprise, I wasn’t expecting it. What kind of a sick joke was this? Apparently, the enemy liked to watch me humiliating myself. But what if I was wrong? What if this was all real? What if this was the answer I was looking for? What am I thinking? All this was confusing. Although, that did nothing to stop me from pondering what was beyond that door. Perhaps, the answers I wanted, answers hidden within my subconscious self. Maybe I already knew what happened to her and my heart just didn’t want to accept
it. A part of me wanted to open the door and know the truth, but the other part didn’t. What if the truth was something that was going to pain me? Could I live with the shock? But what if she is alive and waiting for me somewhere?

  Darn! I couldn’t come up with a decision I could accept. There was no right choice.

  “Den, are you still alive?” I heard a voice, coming from somewhere in the light.

  It was Rick’s voice from what I could tell, and he seemed really worried. Before I even knew it, one of my hands was holding the door about to open it. No, I stopped myself and pulled away, clouded in thoughts. What if this was the only chance I would ever get to know the truth? I really wanted to see Rose again, but I decided now was not the time to look for her. Whatever the case may be, I was going to find her one day soon, just not now. I ran towards the light, after taking two more glances at the door. It took everything I had to run away from that door. Every fiber in my body revolted against me, except for my heart. It told me I was doing the right thing. But was I really? Unexpectedly, I was up again, back in reality or what seemed real. I was covered in debris and dirt up to my shoulders. There were screams everywhere as there was total chaos and what appeared to be the sound of gun fire. “Please tell me this is another bad dream?”

  What had I awoken up to? This was a disaster; there was fire everywhere and destruction raining down upon the entire alien kingdom. What had I done? Had I caused this too, by joining with the resistance? How many people would die because of my actions? I had no idea this was going to happen. The level of this devastation and violence was of epic proportions. No, I had not agreed to this. This was the last thing I wanted on my newly cleansed soul. Main priority- stop the invasion/war.

  I pulled myself out free and struggled back to my feet. The battery that powered my suit had been replaced with a static generator, which took too long to recharge after use. Very bad for this type of situation, but at least—it wasn’t going to explode. Wait, I was finally free of those Pesky Rasian resistance soldiers and their enemies. I could finally go my own way and find my missing crew.