nyslfriends Chapter 243 243: Traces of indigenous civilization
Chapter 243 243: Traces of indigenous civilization
Everyone find a corner or get next to a pillar! Don't panic, take cover!"
Jason kept shouting over the communicator, pressing his back tightly against the stone pillar behind him. He stared up at the widening cracks in the ceiling, a deep sense of helplessness washing over him. An individual's power was always limited. Even if someone was an elite soldier, no matter how fast their reflexes or how powerful their abilities, they could not stop a disaster of this scale.
Everyone felt trapped like sitting ducks, overwhelmed by frustration. They were 500 meters underground, not out in the open. If the cavern collapsed, there was nowhere to run.
"It's coming down! Stay in the corners and wait for rescue!" Jason could only crouch low by the pillar, shouting anxiously.
The subterranean tremors grew violent, triggered by the reactor explosion, causing a chain reaction of cave-ins. A few seconds later, a deafening roar echoed, and the entire cavern roof collapsed.
With a thunderous crash, rocks of all sizes came raining down, drawing gasps of terror from the crowd. A massive boulder grazed Jason's powered armor and slammed down right next to him, barely missing his feet and pinning him into a tiny gap. Then, a torrential downpour of loose stone completely buried the area.
Jason secretly marveled at his luck. In that chaotic moment, it was every man for himself; no one had the capacity to look out for anyone else. He covered his head with his hands, cursing silently. The engine had gone critical three hours ahead of schedule. Those damn bugs must have ruptured the water tank in the cooling chamber! Otherwise, the safety mechanisms of the nuclear engine, meticulously designed by the Federation's top scientists should have made a premature detonation impossible.
The explosion triggered a minor earthquake, registering roughly a magnitude four or five. While that might not mean much on Earth, it was catastrophic in this fragile, honeycomb network of alien caves. In an instant, massive landslides occurred one after another. Countless insects were vaporized by the blast, and thousands of subterranean creatures were buried alive in their burrows.
The immense cavern, covering 200 square meters, could not withstand the violent shaking. Jason and his entire team were completely buried under tons of fallen rock. Fortunately, most of the hundred survivors had managed to wedge themselves along the perimeter walls, protected by their heavy powered armor.
In a cave-in like this, hiding in a corner is the safest option. The falling debris tends to lean against the solid walls at an angle, creating a survival triangle. This tiny pocket provides just enough breathing room and shields the occupant from direct impacts.
Still, while fortune favored the main group, others were not so lucky. Specifically, the eight-man recon team that had just gone out to explore were now in extreme danger.
The collapse hit them instantly, burying them inside the narrow passage. Then, the ground beneath their boots buckled under the sudden weight of the falling rock, cracking wide open into a deep hole. The fireteam tumbled down into the darkness along with a torrent of loose stone.
In the deafening roar of grinding rock and panicked shouting, no one in the main cavern noticed their disappearance. The falling debris formed a massive underground mudslide, dragging the men deeper into the cave network. Against the raw fury of nature, even powered armor was useless; they could only drift passively like helpless ragdolls. Several soldiers even blacked out from the violent impacts.
The collapse finally ground to a halt after three to five minutes, and a heavy silence settled over the ruined tunnels.
Jason shook his head, clearing his blurred vision. He was pinned beneath a heavy slab, left with barely enough room to move. Shaking off his disorientation, he quickly activated the internal communicator, instructing everyone to remain perfectly still and calm to minimize oxygen consumption.
"...Stay steady, team. We just cycled our emergency oxygen supply, which should last us two to three days. The rescue teams outside will find us soon."
In truth, Jason had no idea if a rescue team could penetrate half a kilometer of solid rock to find them.
After an unknown amount of time...
"Leo, wake up! Wake up!"
Leo felt a heavy gauntlet tapping against his helmet visor. He was one of the eight soldiers from the missing scout team. He groggily opened his eyes, and upon seeing the figure standing over him, he instinctively called out, "Sarge!"
"Run an immediate diagnostic scan. Any internal bleeding? Can you still move?" the fireteam leader, Sergeant Will, asked anxiously.
When Will had first regained consciousness, he found himself in a massive, unfamiliar cavern where the ambient temperature had spiked to a warm 18 degrees Celsius.
Hearing Sergeant Will's voice, Leo groaned. Every muscle in his body ached, and he had no idea how many times he had been battered by the underground mudslide. He checked his suit's vitals and forced himself to stand. "Nothing broken, Sarge... I can still move. Just a slight sprain in my right ankle, nothing serious."
"Good to hear!" Will breathed a sigh of relief. "Let's work together and dig out the rest of them first." He yelled into the local square channel, "Anyone else conscious? Sound off and ping your location!"
Faint distress calls echoed back from the piles of debris. The rest of the team was completely pinned beneath the loose rock, unable to move a muscle.
Sergeant Will activated the plasma-saw on his left gauntlet, and the high-frequency blade hummed to life with a fierce spin. He waved his hand and said, "Alright, let's clear some rubble."
Thanks to their mechanized strength, they quickly unearthed the shallowly buried survivors. Surprisingly, none of them had sustained critical injuries. Once again, their heavy powered armor had made the difference between life and death. Without that reinforced metal casing, they would have lost limbs or been crushed to death in the mudslide.
Aside from the visor's material vulnerability to bio-acid corrosion, the Federation gear performed flawlessly. Even the transparent faceplates were engineered from high-grade, reinforced composites capable of withstanding industrial sulfuric acid or aqua regia. However, the bio-acids secreted by the black swarm had evolved over millions of years. The design teams could never have foreseen such an extreme anomaly, so no one blamed the Senior Scientists.
With more hands free, the digging went faster. After more than three hours of grueling labor, all eight survivors were safely pulled out. They gathered in a tight circle to assess their tactical situation.
"Oxygen is stable, gives us about three days," Will reported, checking the squad's synchronized telemetry. "Rations will hold for two. But our sub-zero cooling gas is critical, we only have about five hours of refrigerant left to mask our thermal signatures. We're in a tight spot."
Another young Marine chimed in. "Sarge... if the coolant runs dry, we could always burrow into the loose sediment to hide our heat from the black swarm. But then we'll just be sitting ducks waiting for rescue."
That was a valid point.
Will considered the option before nodding firmly. "Understood. For now, we scout the immediate perimeter for an ascending shaft. If our cooling gas runs dry and the swarm detects us, we dig in and turtle up. Move out, tight formation, and maintain maximum alertness."
The Marines snapped into position. "Yes, sir!"
As the small fireteam pushed deeper into the subterranean void, the passages opened up into massive galleries, and they began encountering larger alien lifeforms. These creatures watched the eight armored intruders warily, maintaining their distance in the shadows. But these men were hardened Marines, not research scientists; they didn't have the luxury to pause and admire the alien wildlife.
An hour later, Will's team crossed into a stifling, hyper-humid zone. Their suit sensors registered an ambient surface temperature of 20 degrees Celsius. It was getting significantly hotter the deeper they went.
Sergeant Will suddenly stopped, spotting an anomaly in the darkness. He held up a hand, giving a sharp tactical signal to halt.
Instantly, the Marines raised their plasma rifles, forming a defensive perimeter around their commander. Will crouched down, reaching out a gauntlet to inspect a strange object resting on the cavern floor.
It was a cluster of bioluminescent fungi. But it wasn't growing naturally.
The glowing stalks were tightly bound together like a formal bouquet! The luminescent, bean-sprout-like fungi had their root fibers neatly wrapped and secured by a braided, vine-like rope, their glowing tops perfectly arranged into a makeshift torch.