Raptured

“Wha, whaaaa, what do you mea…”

Brrrrrt… brrrooooom-boom-boom-boom-boom. “DIE BLAST YOU!” a voice screamed. Bursts blared through the air, ripping Jebediah to mangled pieces. As the firing ceased, his fresh melting corpse collapsed to the floor.

“JEBEDIAH, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Isaiah lamented as he flung himself over his brethren, “WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!”

“E-excuse me sir, but who are you if I may so ask?” a voice squeaked.

Isaiah opened his eyes; the body was gone, it had disappeared. His face froze in shock, looking up from his blood-soaked hands. He turned to his right. It appeared as if he was in a shining hallway, the floors had a fine finish of iron, and looking down at him was a man in an equally pearlescent lab coat.

“…” Isaiah stared at the man, tears began to pile up in his eyes from frustration, sorrow, and the mental breakdown he was experiencing. “Well then, I’m Ned, it is a pleasure to meet you. Oh, I’m over from the medbay if you are wondering about the labcoat,” Ned smiled kindly at Isaiah as he introduced himself, “Speaking of the medbay, you look awful sir. Here let me assist you.”

Ned gently hoisted Isaiah up and started to help him walk down the hall. Isaiah stared into the distance; his eyes were glazed. His mind was frozen; he couldn’t think; he couldn’t say a thing; all he could do was unconsciously let himself be assisted by the kind stranger.

Suddenly, the lights blared then flickered out. “What the, who turned off the lights?” Ned confoundedly asked the darkness.

“You there, put your hands up!” a voice shouted imperatively as it shined a bright light into Ned and Isaiah’s eyes.

“Woah, woah, woah, who are you guys,” Ned inquired in confusion as he awkwardly raised his hands whilst still attempting to support Isaiah.

“Sir, I think they may be the colonists we were sent here to find,” a voice from behind the light sounded.

“They could still be hostiles, don’t lower your guard!” another voice jutted in.

“Well then what are ya?” the original voice demanded, “Friend er foe?”

“We’re colonists sirs, I sure don...” GUAAAAAAAAAAAH! A scream cut Ned off. The light whipped around out of Ned and Isaiah’s faces, revealing a squad of apparent space marines, and a cyborg behind them. In one hand the cyborg clenched one of the four soldiers’ throats, and his other hand firmly grasped his LB2K blaster at the hip.

“OPEN FIRE!” the leader of the squad shouted as the three men whipped around and blared their blasters. But they were too slow, the cyborg pulled the fourth soldier in front of his body, shielding himself from the blasts. “CAPTAIN, WHY!!!!” the man screamed as his body was shredded to pieces.

“Blast it, need to reload!” the soldiers cursed in unison as they began reloading their blasters.

“Wha- what is that thing!” Ned shrieked.

Tossing away the semblance of his human shield, the cyborg raised his blaster. “Time to die . . . foolish humans,” the cyborg taunted.

“Ge… get down…” Isaiah whispered to Ned, voice broken.

Brrrrr… brrrrrrrrum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum. The cyborg fired away, filling the hall with the blaring sound of his blaster, as Ned was shoved to the floor by a vestigial burst of strength from Isaiah. The bursts tore through the soldiers. The cyborg stopped firing and took one menacing step forward, leaving the lifeless husks to fall to the floor.

“Now for you . . . surrender . . . or die!” the cyborg shouted as he lowered his blaster to point at Isaiah and Ned.

“PLEASE SIR! SPARE US!” Ned pleaded in innocent unawareness.

“You are unnecessary . . . time . . . to die,” the cyborg latched his grip of death around Ned’s face and smashed his skull against the wall in one swift movement. His fingers freed of the lowly being, the cyborg returned his attention to Isaiah, as Ned’s body slipped to the floor and his corpse joined the pool of carnage. “You will . . . come with . . . me,” the cyborg ordained.

The cyborg extended his arm and reached for Isaiah, his metallic fingers dripping in blood, as they moved ever closer. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOO! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Isaiah screamed; the sense of survival reawakened him. He skittered backwards, slipping through the pool of blood which oozed from the bodies. Back he slid, down the hall, away from the clutches of death reaching for him, as the lights flickered, and the floors quaked. As he scrambled backwards his mind spun, the hall twirled around him, filling his mind with delusions. Despite the state of his bewilderment, he somehow managed to get to the end of the hall, bumping into the wall. Staggering up, leaning against the wall for support, he turned and ran.

His heart thumped in his chest; his heart thumped out of his chest. Tears streamed down his face; faces streamed down his tears. His feet pounded against the floor; the floor pounded against his feet. Hysteria began to set in. The hall was filled with his psychotic laughter as he stumbled along. His pace quickened, his blood beat faster, his mind was ablaze. Running through the hall, he tripped and was sent flying through an open door. He tumbled for what felt like ages and emerged into a chamber filled with light. “Isaiah, what are you doing here? I told you to go down the other hall, why’d you follow me?” a voice echoed from a figure outlined in the light.

“Hu hu hu… ha… hahahahah… HAHAHAHAHAH!”

“Isaiah… what is wrong with you… stay back!”

Thunk. The light dimmed from Isaiah’s eyes as he slumped to the floor.

In his unconscious state, he heard seemingly distant voices conversing. “Come on, we need to get out of here Jebediah,” “Yeah Samuel, but what’ll we do about him, he’s crazed now…” “If he’s still hostile just knock him out again, let’s just get outta here.” Sccccrrrch. “Wha was that!” “SHHHH.” Sccccrrrrch. “I think it’s here, just leave him behind, shove him behind that crate, cyborg might not see him.”

As he came to, Isaiah felt himself being dragged along the floor and shoved up against a wall. He felt the hand against his shoulder retract but he reached out his hand before it left, “Brother, don’t leave me here…” Isaiah pleaded, his eyes still blurred.

“Come on Jebediah! We gotta go!” Samuel whispered loudly to Jebediah.

“Where . . . do you think . . . you are . . . going? Surrender . . . or . . . die!” a voice from the shadows declared.

“RUN!” Samuel shouted.

Brrrrr… brrrrrrrrum-bum-bum-bum-bum-bum. The blasts illuminated the hall. The horrid beams shimmered in the cloud of blood that sprayed from Samuel’s body as they tore through him. As the firing ceased, his hole-punched body fell to the ground, fluttering, falling slowly as if it was made of paper.

“NOOOOOOOO! DIE YOU CONFOUNDED CLUNKING CYBORG!” Jebediah screamed as he lunged out from behind the crate and blasted his gun, aiming for the cyborg which had already vanished. As his gun eventually overheated, he stopped firing. Tears streamed down his face, rage transforming into sorrow. He turned around, slowly, towards his fallen comrade. “Samuel, why, why’d it have to be like this. WHY!!!!!”

“Huuuuu,” Samuel wheezed, “Jeb... don worry bou me… it’s game oer man, ge outta here alive.” Samuel was dead. His cousin sat in the pool of his blood as Samuel let his last breath go.

“I will avenge you. WE WILL AVENGE YOU!” Jebediah shouted, as his sorrow turned back to rage. Jebediah jumped to his feet, sprinting down the hall that the cyborg seemingly disappeared down. He ran off into the distance, and his chant of death once more trailed down the halls, “OH NO YOU DON’T! DIE BLAST YOU! YOU PIECE OF…”

Isaiah was all alone once more. His comrades, his cousins, his friends, they had left him behind. One to death, the other to the death that awaited him. The blood of Samuel lay spattered on the floor in front of him; the blood of Jebediah stained on his hands; the blood of Ned and the soldiers soaked into his hair and ragged clothing. All he could do was run. There was nothing left for him; only grief, only sadness, only horror, so he ran. He ran as he had before. Running for what? Why did he run? What was there to live for anymore?

“UAGHHHHHHHH!” The screams of his comrades echoed through the abysmal hallways of the abysmal colony of the abysmal planet, long repeated throughout his mind. He couldn’t take it any longer, the horror, the despair. It overwhelmed him as he sank to his knees and scrabbled at the wall for support. His mind withered, his vision blurred, everything was collapsing beneath him. But before he could slip into the peace that would be death, he noticed a light in the distance. “A light, a light!” he thought as his mortal husk summoned some unknown energy from some equally mysterious source and propelled him forth.

He scrambled down the twisting hall, staggering from his wounds. Hoping only to reach that light, that light that seemed so close, yet so very far. Finally, as he rounded a corner, he saw the light emanating from a doorway. He floundered down the hall and rushed into the embrace of the light only to find, to his horror, it was himself looking upon himself.

Bewildered, bemused, befuddled, he stared, astounded at the sight that lay before him. The depths of the monitors in the monitors dragged his mind further into the abyss of hysteria. The false beacon of hope’s cackles resounded throughout his brain. The walls closed in; the ceiling concaved; the tiling trembled beneath him. Despair exploded in his heart.

“It can’t be,” the words fell flat from his mind, flitting by the screams that could not escape from within. “No, no, NO! Run away,” he attempted to say, yet the only word of warning that could be conveyed was, “Run…”.

As his raging mind calmed, his body arose, which had collapsed onto the cool surface of the monitors. There was no more need for struggle, no need for pain nor sorrow, he realized. The cold grip of death had already ensnared him; there was no escaping his fate.

His head raised and he opened his eyes, gazing onto the reflective surface of one of the twisted screens. Blood oozed from the fingers, coiling ever tighter, as the gleaming eyes of the cyborg drifted forth from the shadows behind him. “Resistance . . . is futile . . . surrender . . . or die,” the words floated by, as the world went dark, and his mind shut down.

Shapes and senses shifted about. Shards of sanity seemingly streamed around. His mind saturated by shadows; pain shot through; screams brought forth by the snare of the cyborg.