I Will Follow You Into the Dark

It’s been awkwardly silent for ten minutes now. Jack is frozen, still shocked at seeing one of those creatures for the first time in almost two hundred years, near two thousand if he counts the time he spent buried beneath Bute Park. His hand is still over Curr’s mouth, which causes a strange look to come over his face. The younger man mumbles something unintelligibly into Jack’s hand which makes him finally snap out of his daze.

“What?” Jack uncovers his mouth.

“Just… asking how long we were going to stay like this.”

“Right,” Jack looks back to the building. “We need a way in.”

“That place is a fortress. How can you possibly expect to get inside?”

Jack flashes a smile, almost as bright as his usual ones before this mess happened and proudly displays his new wristband that looks similar to his old vortex manipulator. “Took a little detour to one of the first Time Agencies before I was on record. Nipped it from storage. This baby can unlock any door, shut down most communication systems and recording devices, has limited transport battery power but for some reason can store music. Don’t ask.”

Curr looks at him blankly, “That little brown thing can do all that?”

Jack doesn’t answer, dropping the glimmer of his cheerier self instantly, searching for a way inside the building. He makes his way to the side of the facility, noting how it seems to just go on for miles.

“Your face. Back there. You looked like you knew them.”

Jack just nods, flipping his wriststrap open and unlocks the first door he sees.

“How? If you don’t mind my asking…”

“They invaded my home planet. At least, they will,” he ignores the skeptic look on Curr’s face and continues. “Took my brother and countless others.”

“So are you here to stop them?”

“I’m here for the breath,” Jack pauses for a moment. “I’ll try and stop them later.”

He digs in his greatcoat and pulls out a handgun. Curr stares at it wide-eyed.

“I take it you’ve never used one before?”

Curr shakes his head.

“It’s simple,” Jack demonstrates. “Two hands. Aim and gently squeeze the trigger.”

Curr nods again dumbly as Jack drops the gun into his hand. The weight is foreign to him. The gun makes it seem more final to him. They’re really here and they’re actually going to try and steal Zahdanium breath from the Ralidanians. Jack pushes the door open and Curr follows him inside.

- - -

The inner sanctum of the Ralidan prison camp is a maze of tunnels, cells, offices and chambers. One after another. Implements of torture line the halls and it’s quite obvious they’re put to good use. It’s very silent, footsteps can be made out clearly. Jack assumes it’s because the cells and chambers are soundproof. In that sense it makes the silence much worse.

Both of them have their guns drawn, Curr’s in a shaky hand. A door opens nearby, causing them both to jump back against the wall. As soon as two of the creatures make it past Jack he shoots them both through the skull and twice more through the chest. Their blood splatters everywhere, getting both Jack and Cuur, the latter letting out a shout at the sound of Jack’s weapon going off. The Ralidanians fall to the ground and Jack quickly searches for anything useful.

“Curr. Help me lift his side,” Jack grunts.

Curr obliges, dropping to his knees and using all of his strength to help push the large creature over. Jack looks it over.

“Damn, nothing.”

“Maybe if we check the room they were in. Try and find a map or something.”

Jack’s lips curl into a genuine smile, “Nice work.”

Curr smiles back and they both rise, heading into the room the two creatures emerged from.

It’s a small room, a lot smaller than the few they’ve seen so far. It’s dark, only lit by three orbs and there’s what seems to be large bits of technology laying about.

“It looks like a control room,” Jack says, running his hands over one of the boxes of wires and circuits.

“Yes, some of this is familiar,” agrees Curr as he sits down and presses a button. A row of keys light up, similar to a computer keyboard.

“You can use this?” Jack asks him, impressed.

“Used to repair old H-7 models. They’re pretty similar,” he sounds distracted, black eyes flitting from the keys to the screen.

“You know, if you’re ever bored of your job. Maybe there’s a spot for you to work for me.”

Curr laughs weakly, “No thanks. This is more than enough excitement for me for a lifetime,” he taps away for a few more minutes as Jack keeps an eye on the door.

“There! Got it. Three floors up. Room G51.”

“You are brilliant, Curr.”

“Thanks, I jus-”

“Let’s go,” Jack cuts him off, exiting the control room and heads for the lift. Curr hurries after him, smile still in place from the Captain’s compliment.

- - -

The lift opens, metal doors revealing the floor is filled with five Ralidanians. Each of them notice Jack and Curr, their eyes glowing with rage.

“Curr? I hope you paid attention to my lesson.”

Jack runs out of the lift, pulling out another gun from his coat and fires at the two closest to them. He gets the one on the right through the head but misses the left entirely.

Jack quickly fires again, getting it down this time and fires at another one. He shoots it once in the head and again in the chest and leg. Before he can reload he feels something large and sharp puncture his shoulder.

He cries out in pain as the Ralidanian lifts him up and tosses him across the room. He hears the harsh flapping of wings before the creature is on top of him again. He manages to flip over before it rips into him again and Jack grabs a large blade from inside his coat. He slices its neck, pushing hard as it cuts through the bone and cartilage.

Jack slumps back against the floor, hearing two gunshots go off across the room.

“I got one!” he hears Curr shout, positively thrilled and Jack smiles faintly again.

He catches his breath and gets up slowly, his head a little fuzzy from the blood loss. Curr comes over and helps him.

“Whoa. How are you still standing from that?”

“Takes a lot more than a scratch to knock me out.”

“That was a bit more than a scratch.”

Jack shrugs him off and turns around, heading to room G51, “Come on. The breath. I need to get out of here.”

They enter the room together, both of their eyes bulging a little at the magnificent site before them. In contrast to the rest of the facility, the walls in this room are white. It’s almost as if the vials are glowing. There must be hundreds of thousands of vials stored inside.

Jack slowly walks up to the massive case, feeling like he wasn’t in control of his body anymore. Finally, after his months of searching and feeling completely hopeless it’s right here, right within his grasp. He picks up three vials, two just in case one isn’t enough and turns around to face Curr.

“Alright, let’s get out of here.”

Curr grins, “Finally, I’m really starting to-”

Jack sees a dark blur and then the deep purple pouring out from Curr’s chest, soaking his shirt. A large talon skewered through the kids chest.

“You’re not going anywhere.”