by Alan Spencer
Ram unloaded four shots from a red gun. The blasts unleashed a brilliant blue laser beam. It pounded a woman whose breasts were serrated gills. Her eyes were fully exposed in the sockets, giving her an insane expression. The beam absorbed into her skin and turned her inside out, ripping flesh and exposing her insides.
"Molecular displacement," Dr. Fleming said, paddling towards Ram. "Works every time. Now watch this. This'll knock your socks off!"
Dr. Fleming clutched two green guns. "Pressurizers!"
The purple beam hit two different human sharks. It was like two giant hands clapped down on each one. They were squashed and flattened in two seconds flat.
Buffy surfaced, and she shoved a purple gun into the mouth of a man shark about to eat her from the head down to the toes. A bolt of whitish electricity blazed from the space gun. The shark's head lit up a blinding neon white color, and the shark's body twisted into itself like a wrung out towel. Blood, guts, and bile spurted from both ends.
"Fuck yeah," Ram cheered. "Show them who they're fucking with. Send them to whatever hell fish go to!"
Ram wanted to immediately take his words back. A wave of a hundred human sharks were battering the water and coming for them. Their weapons were powerful, but they couldn't hit every target before the enemy closed in.
"Step back, pussies," Pathfinder said, rising up from the water. "No need to shit your pants. Keep it inside of you for now."
Pathfinder's chest opened up. Twin barrels protruded forth. The cannons unleashed thousands of rounds of ammunition. Each bullet acted like a grenade, and hundreds of shark-human hybrids were chewed up into pulped red.
"Now's the time to duck," Pathfinder said. "Close your eyes and keep your mouth closed."
Ram did what he was told. He covered himself over Buffy as she screamed at the tonnage of human gore coming their way. A warm gut tsunami lifted them off of their feet, hurled them back twenty feet, and they landed in a punchbowl of red water.
"Get up. Keep moving. Time's ticking."
Pathfinder helped them up off of their feet. Everybody was dripping with intestines and glistening with gore. Ram had to peel a human cheek from his own face.
They had no time to commiserate how nasty they were. The automated system announced: SIXTY MINUTES UNTIL CORE SHUTDOWN. SELF-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE WILL BE ACTIVATED.
"Everybody's okay," Pathfinder said. "Even you, Ram. You haven't cried once today. You're doing real good."
That robotic asshole can say whatever he wants, Ram thought. If he gets me out of here alive along with everybody else, he can roast me until I'm cooked through good to eat.
They stamped through the water and out of the convention room together, awaiting Pathfinder's next command.
Remains
There was a lot of moving without any talking. They clopped through water levels that varied, from ankle to knee high, back to hip high, and ever-changing. Many of the walls had holes punched through them. Ram imagined sharks powering through them to reach their prey. He was growing numb to the sight of a floating body part or a wad of greasy innards spread out on the water's surface.
They cut through a room to avoid the massive waterfall blocking the hallway ahead of them. There were tables and computers left in disarray. A banner on the wall read: INTERNET USAGE. TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS A MINUTE.
"Twenty-five dollars a minute!" Ram gasped. "Sweet Jesus."
"Wait, didn't the Internet stop existing?" Buffy asked.
"Globo Corps created their own version of the Internet," Dr. Fleming said. "It was meant to be a temporary replacement. It's really old content saved to a database. It keeps people calm when they've lost everything. Anything familiar is comforting."
Ram shook his head at the sight of a partially eaten hand clutching onto a computer mouse. "What's wrong with people?"
Pathfinder stopped and grabbed Ram by the shoulder. "I know you're a football star, and you're used to getting your way, but right now is the time to shut the fuck up, Mr. Rogan. As smart as your social commentary is."
The cyborg patted him hard on the back.
Buffy held back her laughter by putting both her hands to her face.
Fuck you, robot. Later, I'll make sure they turn you to the scrap material they use to make dildos. You'll be up somebody's ass in no time.
They kept treading in the direction of Floor Zero. There were more parts of the ship he hadn't seen. An art gallery was completely ruined. Sculptures and paintings floated in the knee-high water matched with the pieces of the patrons who had been enjoying them.
An odd smell carried in the air. It must've been coming from up ahead, Ram thought, because the stench kept getting stronger and stronger with each new step. They were inside of a health spa with various steam saunas, a Turkish bath, and a large tanning salon. Inside one of the tanning booths, a dog shark was pinned between a functioning tanning salon. It's skin was burned black and was still cooking. The shark had long since died, but the reek of burned skin was too much to take.
"Let's keep moving," Pathfinder suggested in his monotone. "You guys look like you're going to puke. I don't smell anything."
Asshole, Ram thought. He looked at Buffy. She had turned a concerning shade of green. After taking a long trek through many hallways so destroyed and turned inside out they had no idea what the areas used to be, they came upon something very familiar.
It's Safe Here
A preacher waved them through the threshold and into the church. Behind the preacher were long rows of pews. At the head of the room, a stage had a podium and a life-size statue of Jesus hanging on the cross. Other survivors were scattered about the pews. Ram counted twenty-three persons total. Everybody was wet, exhausted, and judging by their faces, checking and re-checking their sanities.
The preacher was named Christopher Bark, or as the young man of the cloth said to everybody, "Call me Chris."
"We can't stay here," Pathfinder said. "Haven't you been listening to the announcements? This ship will self-destruct in less than an hour. I can take you to Floor Zero to the emergency ships. We can make it out alive."
Chris's youthful features turned into something mean.
"We're not leaving this ship. Everybody here wants to turn themselves over to God. What we've seen recently, we don't want any more time alive. We are ready to die. The lord can take us any time now."
Dr. Fleming tried to talk sense into the shaken preacher.
"We can get you to Second Earth. You're upset right now. We're all stressed. That's understandable. Let us help you. We can make it to safety. Please, we're here to see you out of this situation alive and well. Let us help."
Chris shook his head. "Our time is up. Humanity should've burned along with Earth."
"That's right," a voice said at the door. "It's about time they understood the truth."
Mercy was half in the water, and half sticking up on the surface. He floated in place, and said, "The lord's message has reached these people. They are smart. God will be merciful. I'll eat you fast. The pain will be worth waking up on the other side and walking through the gates of heaven. I'll show you the way."
Pathfinder 3000 pointed his arm out straight. His hand unhinged at the wrist. The nub of his arm was a large gun barrel. "This barrel is like my dick. It's a long piece of hot steel about to be lodged up your tight fishy ass!"
A giant BOOM exploded. The area around Mercy was flying water and flames. Ram couldn't tell if Mercy had avoided the gun's wrath, or not.
Too much else was going on.
The survivors in the pews, including Chris, rushed to their seats and prayed. Ram's eyes widened when at the head of the room, a blue shark bashed through the wall and shattered the statue of Jesus dying on the cross. The same shark rammed through four rows of pews to get his mouth around a cowering woman and her daughter.
Ram unleashed three shots from his laser gun. The four bull sharks weaving their way towards him lit up like a CAT scan picture and were instantly cooked into flyi
ng ash pieces.
Buffy unloaded three laser shots. The molecular displacer forced the shark's guts from inside its body. Fountains of compressed innards shot out from its mouth and anus.
"God take me now!" Chris shouted. "We're ready to see you in heaven!"
Mercy lunged out of the water, snatched off the preacher's head in his mouth, and flopped back into the water. The preacher's headless body kept his hands together, somehow still praying. Two other sharks chomped on the rest of him, and the man of the cloth was nothing more than blood on the water.
Pathfinder's eyeballs were machine gun nozzles that erupted in machine gun spray. The shots scattered the fifteen circling sharks from their position.
"Broil, boil, fry, season, and fuck you up!"
Pathfinder bent forward and out his legs came large branching flames. He flew across the air with the speed of a missile. The cyborg punched through the sharks like a bullet, killing each one he pulverized.
When the cyborg touched back down, and the room was clear of threats, the machine said, "Fish are like semen. They all swim upstream."
"What?" Ram was confused. Why was the cyborg such a wise-cracking asshole? "Why do you keep saying weird shit?"
Dr. Fleming smiled. "I programmed him to be like that. I thought some humor could get us out of a tough situation. I guess I was a tad overzealous."
"It's weird," Ram said, "but at least he's saving our asses."
They weren't sure what direction to go in until at the head of the room, an entire school of sharks inside the mounting wave were heading right for them.
Dr. Fleming pointed at the hole created by the shark behind the podium. "Up there! Hurry!"
Together, the group retreated to the hole. Sharks were right behind them. Pathfinder was at the back of the group. The cyborg's legs kept taking him forward, as his torso spun at the hip, and he was turned completely around. Guns were blazing out of his eyes, chest, mouth, and arms. Between the clatter of booms and the splatter of hit targets, the group could hear the machine's maniacally-delivered quips.
"You're past due on a rectal grenade!"
"Damn shark guts stink like a Tijuana whore's tampon!"
"I never signed any petitions concerning the environment. Yeah, I'm an asshole! Fuck you!"
"Take that, you nasty salt water smelling, frowny-faced, mercury tasting, six-pack ring wearing, bait-eating motherfuckers!"
"You eat worms. You eat pawn scum. You eat each other's shit. NOW EAT LEAD!"
"Is it true? Did Led Zeppelin fuck a woman with a fish? No matter. I'm here to fuck you with my guns!"
"How do sharks mate? I guess it doesn't matter. You can't do anything with your genitals after I blow them the fuck off!"
"Die, bastard sharks!"
Behind them, gun smoke and flying obliterated shark pieces made a constant loud and wet splatter soundtrack. The narrow stairs channeled down, down, and down. The corridor abruptly ended with one big room.
Everybody halted.
What they discovered was another chamber of horrors.
Executions
The passage behind them imploded on itself when the ceiling caved in. Stacks of broken steel pillars and shards of concrete formed an impassible hill. They were trapped in a large tiled room. The group had no choice but to stare at what lay heaped in the room.
Hundreds of corpses.
They were staff members. Those from hospitality, engineering, bartenders, hostesses, and laborers alike were pulped through with so many bullets, many were left in sloppy pieces. Bullet casings littered the tiled floors by the thousands. Holes riddled the walls. Water seeped into the room and gurgled loudly down the drains spread throughout the killing box.
Ram couldn't hold himself back. He threw Dr. Fleming up against the wall and held his fist up ready to strike the frightened man if he didn't say something that made damn good sense.
"Why is this room full of murdered people? Spit it out!"
Dr. Fleming didn't cower.
"Ram, stop! I can't say how this happened. I'm sorry about their deaths. It's wrong, and insane, and unnecessary, and plain cruel, but I had nothing to do with this. You must believe me, Ram. Please. I'm not your enemy."
Ram was grabbed by the neck and spiked onto the ground. Unfortunately for him, he landed in a pile of liquid bodies. He couldn't get back to his feet without having to touch clammy cold skin, sticky blood, and slithery cold organs.
Pathfinder stood between Ram and Dr. Fleming as a barrier.
"No more threatening the doctor. This is not Dr. Fleming's fault. According to the ship's log," the cyborg accessed his internal file, "announcements were made to each wing of the ship. They were all told to convene here for safety. They were promised safe passage off The Redeemer."
"And they were executed!" Ram couldn't stifle his anger, or the horror. "Murderers. It's sickening. How could this happen?"
"Globo Corps didn't want certain people to make it to Second Earth, but they needed working bodies to get The Redeemer up into space." Dr. Fleming crossed himself and muttered a prayer. "I'm sorry. That's all I can say. It doesn't do any damn good. I know. I'm still very sorry."
Buffy was eying the gore-drenched bodies. "In our wildest dreams, if we make it to Second Earth, you think we'll be safe there?"
Dr. Fleming threw his hands up. "I don't know. Who knows if anything's changed on the planet now that they think we're coming. It's impossible to predict what Globo Corps will do in the wake of this tragedy."
"That means it's not safe," Ram muttered. "Not now. Not ever."
"I don't know is what this means," Dr. Fleming sighed. "I haven't been in contact with those on Second Earth for months. There's honest-to-God people on that planet. They're not all like Ernie Pine and Bryce Saxon. Who knows what kind of politics are going on now? We won't know until we get there."
"Then let's get there," Ram said with a new determination. "These people can't die for nothing. Somebody has to take down Globo Corps. And if we make it there alive, that's what I'll do. The fucking scum will pay."
Dr. Fleming agreed. "I'm with you on that one. These were crimes committed. And someone will answer for them."
Buffy didn't say anything. Her eyes told him everything. She agreed with his mission, and she accepted it with conviction.
The announcement hit them all hard. SELF-DESTRUCT MODE WILL BE INITITATED IN FORTY MINUTES.
"Get behind me," Pathfinder said. "We need to keep moving."
"How are getting out of here?"
Ram's question was drowned out by the single mini-rocket that shot of the cyborg's barrel arm. The power of the blast punched through the wall. When the dust settled, a large gaping hole allowed them to sneak out of the execution room.
The group kept moving.
Shark Tactics
That man machine has to be stopped. Maybe I can't stop him. But I can slow them down. If The Redeemer self-destructs with everybody still on board, our plan will succeed. All will go to God. All shall be holy. As it should be.
I'll cut them off before they can leave. Their weapons are too strong for me to fight back against them. I can only try to deliver God's will.
I know what to do now.
Mercy swam hard, intending to do everything to keep Ram and his friends on the ship.
They were keeping a good pace. Ram's body ached from top to bottom. They had descended fifteen floors throughout various ruined corridors. Pathfinder kept trudging on undaunted and without fatigue. Lights were flickering from the ceilings. Some would stay lit, while others went dark.
"The ship's slowly losing power," Dr. Fleming said. "It's gradually shutting itself down. We'll be in serious trouble if we don't make it in time. When this ship blows, it'll blow to kingdom come. We'll be reduced to dust."
"Gee thanks for the update," Buffy said. "I feel uplifted."
Before anybody else talked, they stepped into a room that resembled a sandy beach that had survived a hurricane. The water beyond the fake beach
was gargling and belching with giant bubbles.
Ram clutched onto his red gun. "What's next? Rabid flounders?"
"No," Pathfinder said. "Not rabid flounders. Great white shark."
Surging from the water, the great white leaped up high and landed on top of Pathfinder. The beast swallowed him whole.
Buffy kept screaming. Ram couldn't move. Dr. Fleming blinked and blinked, as if to wish it all away.
The cyborg was gone.
They expected the robot to somehow escape, but that wasn't happening. And there wasn't time to wait. The great white was coming for them next.
"Well, that's fucking disappointing." Finally Ram took charge. "Move your asses! Robo-asshole's not here to protect us anymore. I am!"
Ram unloaded four laser shots. They didn't hit home, but they displaced enough water, the great white was sucked down into a temporary undertow of spinning water.
They cut across the beach, and fled the room.
Only more horror would come their way.
This time, Ram wasn't scared.
He was fucking pissed.
Escalating Situation
Ram didn't have time to process where they were going, except for down. Dr. Fleming was ahead of them. He had laser guns blazing in both hands. A laser hit home on the belly of a tiger shark. The laser caused its innards to burst from the stomach, tie around the body, and squeeze so hard the entire mass erupted from the pressure.
"Molecular displacer!" Dr. Fleming kept shouting his war cry. "YOU LIKE IT? TAKE THAT! AND THAT! A-ND THAT!"
Buffy's guns caused everything it shot to shrivel and burn. Ten sharks were cooked into blackened crisps. Ram blasted a hammerhead and squashed it mid-air with ten tons of pressurizing force.
They were running so fast, everything was a blur of motion. They were forced to go right, then left, then double back, and bolt forward again. Somehow, they ended up on a moving escalator. They were heading down towards the ground floor.
