Ryan got up from the pilot's chair and stretched his arms.
"Ok, we will be arriving at the Hadean orbit within 20 minutes. The plan is to use the landing pod to defend to the surface and find Jas. Then we come back to the ship, and go home." he said.
The moon Hades glowed with a bright red. The surface consisted of iron. The volcanoes on the surface were constantly erupting, releasing thick gases into the atmosphere. The M612 approached the moon from behind. The first glimpse they got of it was a reddish arc caused by the refraction of light by the moon's atmosphere. As they emerged from the shadow of the moon, the arc expanded into the moon. It just like how the engines of the space-plane appeared peaceful from a distance. Only when you look closely do you see the hellish surface.
The radio in the ship crackled for a second until a voice came out of it -
"Guys! Guys it's me Jas. I have sent you my coordinates in this transmission. Come qui-"
Ryan stood still. He had to process this. Was it really Jas? Or was it a trap by Jas' captor. He thought. He deliberated.
"Yo! Zack! Listen to this!" He called, playing back the audio once more.
Zack listened. He heard a voice that he heard more than Ryan heard. He recognised it, and confirmed with Ryan. "It is really him."
Ryan was overjoyed to hear this. He collected the audio from the transmission and noticed that the crests and peaks of the sound waves were false. In reality the audio was a code. Each spike was a 1 and each crest was a 0. Put it all together and you get a coordinate. Using this algorithm, Zack decoded the message and entered the landing point on the landing pod's computer.
As soon as the ship dropped into orbit, the team put on the spare space suits and headed into the landing pod. Ryan fumbled with the controls and figured how to detach it. The pod looked like a glass sphere attached to a cuboid. The glass was made using a new polymer that was both transparent and hard. The pod turned to the crimson surface and flew downwards at the speed of sound. Just before touching the surface, it slowed down to a landing speed and dropped to the ground breaking the the rocky surface as it landed.
Ryan opened his tracker. The coordinates sent by Jas were a few feet away. He along with the others put on radiation suits along with an air filter. They opened the airlock and a hot gust of wind hit them. A few feet away was a tall box. They slowly walked towards it and noticed a button on it. Zack pushed the button. The box opened into an elevator which opened to them. The group reluctantly got in. As the doors closed, peaceful elevator music played.
"Notes to self, if I ever become a supervillain, never use elevator music." said Sam.
After the elevator opened, what the team saw was a wreckage. Though the elevator size that the are was pressurised and has breathable air, they didn't believe it for a second. The room they walked into was a huge hall. The wires hung out of the wall, the floor was misshapen. A huge crack ran across the tiles like a fork of lightning. The walls around them were built to store military gear. The shelves attached to the walls had opened up. A few had broken guns in them and few had rotting food in them. Pieces of the ceiling had fallen to the ground. Among the wreckage was an unused exoskeleton. It looked like it would fit a well built person and definitely not a nerdy teenager. Ryan immediately wanted to take the thing apart. He was an engineer in the making. He decided to take away the weapons from it just in case.
"So there is a sniper with some ammo left, dual pistol sets, armour, spare air pistol, plasma cannon and..." he looked at the gloves placed where the arms of the exoskeleton should be "gloves"
"Dual pistols are mine" said Alex.
"I call sniper" said Sam.
"Cannon's mine. It looks like it's from Halo." said Zack.
"And I get the... gloves." said Ryan picking them up. He and wore the pair of winter gloves which readjusted themselves according to the size of his hand. He flexed his fingers to see if they fit when all of a sudden, the gloves turned into hard but flexible covers. They covered both his arms entirely. "Woah!"
He flexed his fingers again and the arm length exo-arm turned back into gloves. "Nanotech gloves! Sweet!"
He opened the exo-arms again and closed his thumb. A holographic display showed up showing different things that could be made using the exo-arms. He selected the option that said blade and flexed his fingers. The nano-tech from his shoulders moved downwards as a blade protruded from his knuckles. Just as it finished forming the blade, a disc hit the glove and attached itself to the glove. It expanded into a sort of handcuff. Ryan looked at where the shot came from and saw Sam with the gun aimed at his hand.
"Sorry!" said Sam. She pressed a button and the handcuff detached and folded back into a disc. Ryan picked it up and threw it back to her.
This jarred Ryan back to the reality of the situation. Everyone stood around in their radiation suits staring at the large opening in the wall. Ryan tapped the side of his helmet to turn in the flashlight and led the way into the darkness.
"We are... at the coordinates..." said Ryan, confused.
Suddenly there was a loud thud.
From the ceiling there was a single stage light that shined on Jas who was bound and gagged.
"Looking for him?" said a voice from the darkness.
Another light shined on what appeared to be the person who spoke. He was a tall man wearing a black trenchcoat. He had a scruffy beard and scar on his eye. The cylinder was in his hands. He jerked the cylinder to the side and the cylinder elongated along both sides to form a black-bladed scythe. In the strong stage lights the rim of the blade glowed with a sharp white.
"Who... who are you?" asked Ryan. Ryan tapped his helmet and it disappeared.
"My name is John X Alester. Your father, that monster, called me X." said X., anger seeping through his voice
"Alester?" asked Zack.
"Yes, I am your father's brother. But I never was treated like one."
"That can't be true. He isn't an isolating monster." said Ryan calmly.
X's scar glowed and rippled. His voice distorted as he spoke. "Your father tortured me for thirty years calling it science! Every day I woke up on a slab with agony. Every second lasted a century. Oh right, you don't know."
"Don't know what?" said Ryan. Ryan noticed Zack had snuck away and was behind the chair Jas was on. Ryan immediately realised what to do. "Also did you buy a stage light?"
"A-" X stopped mid sentence "Yes I did. It gives me a dramatic entrance." he said, deciding to play along.
"Sweet" said Sam. She had also realised they needed to keep X's attention towards them so that Jas could escape. "Y'know what? Next time, get a smoke machine. That would look twice as badass." continued Sam.
"A fine suggestion. Tha-"
"And add like a real sound system so that you voice is all distorted and villain-like. I mean it does sometimes in your case, it does distort, but other times, you sound like my uncle." added Alex.
"Now wait a second, I do not-"
"You should also add like a custom soundtrack and play it through the speakers and cue your movements with it. Like if you plant that blade thingy onto the ground, there can be a loud drumbeat." said Ryan
By this time Zack had untied Jas and started to walk away. But since Jas was still dizzy after being knocked out with chloroform, his steps were heavier and sloppy. Accidentally, he kicked the chair backwards and knocked it over.
Zack hissed "Crap." through his teeth.
X heard this and stayed calm. He turned his gaze towards Zack. "You know, this weapon could fly through you and come back to me before you even knew what had happened. So I suggest you stay right where you are. Now, down to business. You want him back, I'll exchange him for a location." He said this aiming the blade at Zack glaring at Ryan.
Ryan realised what he wanted. "I don't know where my father is. I've searched for almost my entire life."
"Don't lie to me. I've seen your wall. I've gone through your computer. I've seen hundreds of gigabytes of security footage. You've seen where he's been. I've observed you for a few months now Alester. How do you think the scythe got to you? Use your head. I am told that you are the 'silent genius' of the lot."
"Considering that my brother's life hangs on what I say I would not lie to you. There is no logical reason as to why I would not exchange nothing but information for Jas' life. Even if I did know, there's a good chance that you might not find my dad, so it doesn't matter. Anyway, now that you know that I don't know, Give me my brother." said Ryan.
"Wrong answer." said X.
Ryan kicked X in the leg in a hopeless effort in getting to his brothers. He slid below X's legs but fumbled and fell on his face as soon as he got out the other side. Sam shot at him with a well aimed bullet. However X swung the blade and deflected it away. Zack took a shot at X with his cannon but the entire shot dissipated on touching X's hand. Ryan scrambled back on his feet and ran towards the elevator along with Jas. Alex and Sam ran followed by Zack. X struck the ground with the edge of his blade. Red arcs of pure energy appeared to crawl quickly through the ground. When it reached the team, the ground cracked in half. One side had the team on it and the other side had X. The team had managed to get to the elevator. The side with X fell downwards slowly.
"Thanks guys," murmured Jas as he got up, grabbing the spare pistol because guns were cool. He dusted his jacket and proceeded to the elevator. Ryan tapped his suit and his helmet reappeared. He noticed something through the corner of his eye. A sharp white light followed by a dark shadow was spinning towards them. It looked like a black disc with a white edge.
"Guys, LOOK OUT!" Ryan shouted and flexed his fingers, creating a flat reinforced shield using his nano-gloves. He pushed Jas behind him as he tried to shield his brother from the scythe. Zack charged up his cannon and aimed at the disc's edge and fired. The plasma narrowly missed the spinning blade. Alex tried to shoot down the blade as it approached. As the sound of bullets echoed through the cracked hall, the blade cut through Ryan's shield as if it were made of butter. It sliced through and stopped when it hit something behind Ryan. Ryan slowly turned around hoping it wasn't what he thought it was. He came face-to-face with the hilt of a massive sword.
Behind him, the massive sword's edge was protruded out of Jas's chest. Ryan was shook. He could hear his heartbeats in his head. His vision turned blurry. He ran to face Jas. Jas was as shocked as everyone else. Sam covered her mouth. Zack rushed towards Jas. He dropped to his knees. Ryan knelt down looked at his brother. Cracks formed on Jas' face, distorting his face that was already contorted in pain and surprise. "Guys... I'm..." His last words trailed off, barely audible.The cracks on his face had spread to his hands. Blue light shone through the cracks. Slowly Jas's fingers turned into light. He tried to grab onto Ryan's shoulder but his hand disappeared. Within seconds his entire body turned into blue light which grew brighter by the second. All of a sudden, the light faded until all that was left was a dim blue shade and a sword where Jas was standing.
Zack grabbed Ryan by the arm and dragged him into the elevator as Ryan yelled Jas' name. Sam and Alex followed them. As soon as they got to the hellish Hadean surface, they ran to the landing pod.They got in, and Ryan immediately slumped onto a passenger seat with a dazed expression. For the first time in his life he had to question whether or not the previous events had happened or not. A tear rolled down his face as he remembered every second of his time with Jas. They were just fleeting images turning black and white slowly fading away. He was in shock, his brain couldn't produce clear images of them. These stills, these colourless photos in the mind's eye were all that he could see. That was all he had left of him.
