Galactic Calendar 259872/ 2000 [ Sol Year 4387/ Day 155 of 365. Sol standard year]

  Days after of Crash landing/ 4

  Uninhabited Island / Clearing of Escape Capsule # 405/ Unknown Structure/ Water Chamber

  Galactic Standard Time / After 1520

  Bryke

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  As soon as Jessie dropped down to the island he let them go. Bryke wasted no time in moving away and he almost threw up before swallowing back down. He moved towards the center of the island and started to laugh darkly as the others all moved to him.

  “What happened back there!? How did that thing find you all!?” Jessie demanded.

  Bryke looked down at the island he was standing on and felt along the surface. He found the channels and he almost threw up again.

  “The blood called it. The blood of what you killed,” Bryke said without missing a beat. As he looked into his memories he felt his hand shake. That thing he had seen down there, was bigger than anything had a right to be.

  “The blood!? How was that possible?” Jessie asked, shock in his voice.

  “Bryke found channels in the islands! It carried the blood to the water. We missed them!” Terra said, anger in her voice.

  Bryke looked up to see her looking back towards where they had come from, and then she turned her head to look at them. He was stunned by how wild her eyes looked, how wild and scared she looked. “This whole place, everything about it! It was all connected to having organic cleaners! Those things must have evolved along a planned track! Whoever made this place was able to plan how life evolved here! That’s beyond anything that the Federation can even dream of!”

  Bryke just looked at her and tried to think about that one sentence. There was something about it that bothered him, something that was clawing at his mind. He then went still as suddenly everything made sense in another way.

  “No,” Bryke said suddenly. As everyone looked at him, she smiled and felt a spark of hope. If he was right, then they weren’t up against the monsters that Terra thought they were. “There might be another reason for these lines!”

  Terra looked at him, a strange look in her eyes. “What other reason could there be?! I mean that thing, that Lurker just came for it once the blood hit the water!”

  “But if they were here before, and life evolved because of them? Then it would mean that this is just how this place is. Not that anything planned for it to evolve,” Jessie said with a slow and questioning tone in his voice.

  Zevortro nodded. “Yeah, I mean we don’t know anything. Maybe the lines are there because of a religious reason or something. We just don’t know.”

  “Yeah. There has to be another reason here we can’t see. I refuse to accept that thing I saw was put in as part of this place’s blueprint!” Bryke said, anger in his voice as he looked around.

  “What did you see?” Zevortro asked, his voice soft.

  Bryke looked at them, and he could feel his face start to become full of terror and rage. “Something I think was a head, over twenty feet wide and tall. It was coming up from the depths of this place.”

  He looked around and saw the horror and shock on Zevortro’s and Terra’s faces. Jessie only looked at him, his face hard and he crossed his arms.

  “Something that big is down there!?” Terra exploded, horror in her voice.

  “I saw something that big! And it was coming up!” Bryke said, terror in his voice.

  “Wait, you saw this after that thing sent you away?” Zevortro said, shock in his voice.

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  Bryke looked at him and then he felt his rage spike. “YES! I saw that thing when I hit the water and sank after that Lurker screamed at me! When else could I have seen it?!”

  “No, I meant you as saw that thing after we wounded the Lurker. After it tore off its tentacle and its blood hit the water,” Zevortro said slowly.

  Bryke looked at him before he stopped and felt his heart freeze.

  “Wait, are you saying!?” Terra demanded.

  “Yeah, it makes sense! That Lurker and things like it clean up the dead bodies that hit the water! And then when they're wounded something eats them! I bet that combat only ends with a dead body between Lurkers! Then they go onto the islands to heal and stay away from their predator! But this time, we wounded it!” Zevortro exclaimed as he looked back where they had been. “That must have called the big one!”

  “So that thing that attacked us isn’t the thing at the top of the food chain then? Wonderful. Just wonderful. And who knows what else is out there?” Jessie said as he looked around at the others.

  Bryke could see fear and horror in his eyes. And as he licked his dry lips, he was compelled to ask a question he didn’t want to ask. “What do you mean, what else could be out there?!”

  “I thought the Lurker was the top of the food chain here. But it’s not. Who’s to say that the big thing doesn’t have a predator?” Jessie said bluntly.

  “Oh great! Now we have to worry about something else? What in the black hole is this place!?” Terra asked historically. “I mean, why was it even made!?”

  “It doesn’t matter why this place is here,” Jessie said with a hard tone.

  “It doesn’t?!” Terra demeaned, shock in her voice.

  “No, all that does is we find a way out! And fast before we find some of the Alphas of this place. Maybe I can go and find something, anything. We just need a direction. And we have three of them,” Jessie said as he pointed down.

  Bryke shone his lights down, and then he looked around to see all three of them. To the northeast, was a blue symbol of clouds. To the west was a large green blob and finally, where they had come from was a strange red square. And each of the symbols was in a strange blocky style.

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  Zevortro

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  As he looked down, he tried to think, to figure out what an alien race would use colors for. For all they knew, these things were words and they could mean anything!

  “I don’t know, this is weird. Who knows what this means?” Terra asked from across from Zevortro.

  Looking around, Zevortro saw that she, Jessie, and Bryke had joined him in a circle around the symbols.

  “I don’t think we should go back the other way, we need to go away from that thing back there!” Bryke said with a scowl.

  “Yeah, I know what you mean. So maybe we should go towards one of the others?” Terra said with a slight note of hope in her voice.

  Zevortro nodded as Jessie grunted.

  “Yeah. I’ll go a few islands over and see what I can find there. You three look around this place. There might be something I missed. But where to go?” Jessie wondered as he looked down.

  “This way! I mean, look. That has to mean a cloud made of water, right? And how are clouds formed by water? Waterfalls!” Zevortro said with a small smirk as he pointed at the blue cloud.

  Jessie had to look at it and then he nodded. “Yeah, that makes sense to us. But whoever made this? But it’s not like I have a better idea.”

  “Good luck!” Zevortro said and Jessie nodded before he disappeared.

  As Bryke took a step back in shock, Terra giggled a bit.

  “Yeah, that’s what my friend does. You have to put a bell on him to keep him from doing something sometimes,” Terra said as she giggled.

  Zevortro shook his head, remembering a few friends he had who were just like that. And how much he missed some of them. With a sigh, he stood up and looked around the twenty-foot island, nodding as he did so. “Okay, Bryke? Watch the water. Terra, let’s see what we can find. Do you want the inside or the shore?”

  “I’ll take the shore. And keep an ear out for anything up there!” Terra said firmly. “We don’t know what might attack us from that direction, and Jessie’s gone!”

  Zevortro walked off, nodding as he did so. He tried to keep his ears open, but he knew that Jessie had nanites that helped him. And who knows just how these things could fly here? There was just as much of a chance as a glider then there was a flyer! And for all they knew, something was watching them now.

  But as he looked down at ‘ground’, that thought died. There was something here, something that he had seen before. And he had a good feeling that this was going to help them out.

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  Jessie

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  As he came out of an ‘Air Dash’ Jessie looked around, and then he ‘Air Dashed’ to the right in an instant. He came out five feet away and ten up. Looking down, he saw the thing that he had seen charging at him fly through the space he had been in. And then he saw it turn around. Without thinking, he aimed his pistol up and fired as soon as he came out of another ‘Air Dash’.

  The bolt hit whatever had been hunting him and it gave off a reptilian screech as it fell. Without even waiting, Jessie kept ‘Air Dashing’ away. He knew what that thing was going to expect., and for now he couldn’t care. This time that thing tried to kill him, and even when he had escaped it still tried to hunt him. And that concerned him a lot more than he wanted to admit. He needed to get to another island soon, and then he had to think about what had happened.

  Coming out of his last ‘Air Dash’, he looked down and saw there was another island ten feet away. When he was within a foot from the water, he ‘Air Dashed’, to right above the island and dropped down. With a slight scowl, he looked up and tried to find anything. When he had been in combat with that thing, he hadn’t gotten a good look at it. But he was sure that he hadn’t heard the sounds of winds flapping. And how had it turned on a dime like that, or tracked him?

  “Another problem! And more questions!” He muttered as he looked around. To his surprise, he saw another symbol for clouds on the ground, and only that symbol. The more he looked at it, the more he wondered if it was what they thought it was. The more that he had to hope that they were right. There was something there, something that he just couldn’t see.

  “What is it? What am I not seeing?” He muttered as he looked up and tried to let his senses take in anything that was around. As much as he wanted a chance to rest, this was enemy territory. But if the symbol was right, then he was on the right track. And that meant that he was ready to move on.

  Without a thought, he ‘Air Dashed’, away but when he came out his ‘Dash’ he saw a report from his nanites. There was a sound that was like an old jet engine, and it was coming closer from right behind him. And that was enough to have him to ‘Air Dash’ away again, and then he turned. There at the island, he had just left, there was something, some kind of shadow. Unlike the Lurker that had attacked the others, this thing had a low body that looked like it moved on all fours. And the way that its head/neck was moving around, it was hunting for something. And he had a terrible feeling that it was tracking him.

  As he fell through the air, he instantly ‘Air Dashed’ away, and then he looked back. He was far enough away to not see that thing, but he had a terrible feeling that it was hunting him.