The Green Glutton attack

It all happened in mere seconds.

Levi flew backwards and tried getting away from the moving branches of the Green Glutton. As the branches had no way of seeing them, they moved around the room chaotically trying to capture whatever they could find and consume. They were so fast the three Star-finders could hardly keep up with their movements. Nyco thought that they looked like green whips smashing into everything they could find. Levi was about to press his Warpy when a branch wrapped around his waist. It then segregated the acid and started melting Levi’s suit. The pain made him scream and tensed all his muscles. In less than 5 seconds, Levi was cut in half by his waist and fell to the ground.

At the same time, Silvy also tried to press her Warpy to jump away. Unfortunately a branch wrapped itself on her right arm before she could do it and melted it off. She flew armless into a wall and fell to the floor as she screamed. Silvy’s arm with the Warpy, her way of getting out of there, was now out of reach in the middle of the room.

Nyco did not try to jump away. He saw how they cut Levi in half and flew over to try and help him. The boy had to change his left arm’s armour to a sword to try and slash through some branches. But that would only help momentarily as the acid from the branches he cut started melting the blade. He flew to where Levi was and started panicking.

-Oh God-, he screamed as he saw Levi. Another branch was melting both his arms as he spoke. -I’ll take you both out of here-, Nyco assured him. -Silvy has lost her Warpy too so I’ll grab you and fly to her!-, Nyco explained nervously. -I’ll take us three out of here.

-Calm down, Nyco-, said Levi. -There is nothing you can do for me. I only have mere seconds left. Forget Silvy too. It’s too dangerous to fly over there. You will also get sliced. Just save yourself and tell them the scientists are dead-, Levi indicated. Nyco was shocked at how calm he was. His clone had accepted his demise without giving it much thought. Nyco looked at Silvy and saw her flying, dodging the branches, trying to reach her arm so she could activate her Warpy and get out of there.

-I’m sorry, Levi. I… I’m not going to be able to take your body with me-, Nyco explained with pain in his heart. -But I promise I won’t forget you. You are not just a disposable clone. I’ll remember you-, he assured him.

Nyco flew off to try and save Silvy. He dodged a couple of branches and sliced through a third. The blade on his left arm fell off from the acid. When Nyco was less than 2 meters away from Silvy he activated his Warpy. The orange sphere expanded and engulfed Silvy and Nyco inside. Nyco reached out to Silvy and was able to touch her before the Warpy teleported them.

At the last moment, a branch was also able to smack Nyco in the back, leaving its corrosive acid melting the armoured suit.

Levi watched as Nyco and Silvy disappeared and jumped to the mothership. “Wow, he really made it. Not bad for a rookie”, Levi thought as everything around him went dark.

Nyco appeared in a portal with Silvy. They had escaped the grasp of the Green Glutton.

Nyco was thankful that the Star-Fly’s Warpys were embedded into the suit.
Since the Warpys were a part of the suit, it was as if the suit itself was the Warpy. If not, Nyco would have needed to touch Silvy directly with his skin in order to teleport her. But since touching each other’s skin would be too dangerous to do in space and other planets, the Star-Flys were built with that special characteristic. As long as a suit was inside the orange sphere and touching the suit that used the jumping orb, it would teleport them.

Nyco felt the acid burning the skin of his back. The acid was able to touch Nyco’s skin at the last second so it teleported with him. The boy screamed in pain as doctors from the mothership rushed to help them.

They took Silvy to another room in order to heal her wound. Nyco heard her say “thank you” as they separated them. They took his Star-Fly suit off and pushed him in a stretcher to an operating room.

It took them hours to extract all the acid, but they told him he would eventually recover. As he was a Star-finder, doctors calculated that he would be fine in 2 or 3 weeks with the proper treatment and artificial skin. Nyco remembered the time he had melted the skin of his foot. This pain was significantly worse.

A couple of hours after the operation, Silvy walked inside Nyco’s room and watched him in silence. He found the boy lying face down on a bed.
Nyco felt someone in the room with him, looked up and smiled at his partner.

-Hey, Silvy. How are you? Sorry about the arm and… Sorry about Levi…-, Nyco said with a heavy heart. The girl didn’t say anything, she just got closer and sat down in a chair beside him.

-Why did you save me?-, she asked.

-... because I couldn’t lose you too-, he answered. He had known Levi and Silvy for 3 years now. He couldn’t consider them friends as they hardly spoke or made plans together. But he enjoyed their company and didn’t want anything bad happening to them.

-The most intelligent thing would have been to jump as soon as you saw how dangerous the attacking branches were. Saving me was suicide-, she noted. -You had a 98% failure rate.

-Well… looks like I’m a 2 in a hundred kind of guy-, he smiled.

-Next time you try something like this you will also die. You won’t get this lucky twice-, Silvy continued ignoring his little joke.

-Or maybe I can save you again-, he countered. Silvy got up frustrated. She could not understand how he risked his life for her when the chances of success were so slim. The Star-finder got up and walked towards the door. She was about to leave when she turned back.

-I hope you recover well. See you soon-, Silvy said walking away making Nyco smile.

A few hours later, Nyco got a call from Alan on his E-C.

-Hey Nyco. I’ve just heard about your mission. Are you ok?-, Alan asked.

-Well… My back hurts like hell even though they are giving me enough sedatives to sleep a horse. But that isn’t the real issue… I, I left Levi there all alone…-, Nyco confessed as a tear appeared in his eye.

-I’m sorry to hear this. I really am. He was a great Star-finder-, Alan said.

Nyco did not like that comment. Levi was more than just a Star-finder. He was the partner he had trained with for 3 years. He deserved to be remembered as the boy that liked eating a banana before every training session. Or the boy that liked separating his peas from everything else on the plate. That’s what he would remember of him, not that he was a Star-finder. The blue eyed boy feared that he would also be remembered as just a great asset for the Planet-Gazers.

After the call with Alan a doctor came in to check on his wound. Nyco had a big slash on his back where the plant had poured its acid. The doctor cleaned the wound and changed his bandages.

-I’ve done all I could for you, Star-finder. I must transfer you to a hospital so they continue with your treatment. We are a bit low on resources here I’m afraid-, the doctor informed.

-It’s ok. Thank you for all you’ve done, doc-, Nyco said. -Where will they transfer me to?

-The Planet-Gazer association has told me to transfer you tomorrow to a hospital in Iberika, Earth-, the doctor explained. Nyco’s eyes grew wider when he heard this.

Nyco hadn’t been to Earth since he had decided to join the Planet-Gazers. He felt the nostalgia kicking in. Then a sudden realisation made him tremble. The odds were extremely low but not impossible. Would he bump into Emma while he was on Earth? So much time had passed… He thought it would be weird if he saw her again. He had left Earth in an attempt to free her from having to deal with the fact that he would one day lose all affection for her or any other person.

But that change hadn’t happened yet. He still had feelings for her even though he tried to forget them. Would she feel the same?

Nyco didn’t know if he wanted to see her or not.