Harvel waited. He could feel the heat of the blast on his back. They should be nearly stopped now. If his predictions were correct either Dibbuk should be getting back soon, or he’d be in for a longer night than he had expected. He began collapsing the cells in his arm, dragging the pair closer to the boat.

Boris was long gone. He was probably off doing something horrible. He could check, but that wouldn’t matter at this point. Harvel looked up. He could still see some of the bells ringing out among the stars.

If this was truly going to end tonight he might, at some point, no longer be able to see them. It was good to take them in now while he could. He’d been searching within himself to find where his memories had ended up.

It was slow going. While he might find bits and pieces scattered about, he could never find whole memories. It was like one of those games where you turn over cards and try to make pairs, except there were trillions of cards and the pairs were a thousand a piece. He’d done a fair bit of work so far. He had about six full memories.

Harvel knew he’d have plenty of time to put the rest back together. In time maybe he would get some of his original personality back. As it was, he was running a sort of emulation of Harvel Gillis. The free trial before he would get Harvel Pro+.

He knew who he’d been to some degree. He was starting to put together more accurate speech patterns as time moved on, but it would probably never be the same. Then again, it didn’t have to. Bringing about change wasn’t always bad.

Harvel registered a stirring in the deep. Dibbuk emerged from the darkness, her footsteps landing with furious intent. She stopped in front of her brother, still sitting in the layer of diatomaceous ooze. Harvel began to say something witty, but Dibbuks finger slamming into the front of his face put a damper on this attempt.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a while now, and I’ve always let you dodge. This time I did it with real force. Real violence. That’s what you get for beating the piss out of the damn mushroom.” Dibbuk chided, crossing her arms in disapproval. This all could have been solved much faster if he hadn’t just done whatever Boris had said.

“Fair point. I certainly didn’t consider my options at the time. I will say, it doesn’t talk like it’s helpless.” Harvel agreed, forming his head back into its proper shape. Her new definition of violence was excessively effective.

“I think it’s like mimicry. It knows that’s what humans do to scare other humans. I don’t even think it can fight. That might be why it took me over.” Dibbuk speculated. She’d learned a lot from the fungi. Mostly new curse words in languages she nor anyone else would ever understand, but there had been little bits of useful info in between. She still didn’t know why it cursed so much. Perhaps human Harvel had left an impression.

Harvel nodded. He’d felt the steel of pipes and bits of carapace cease their virtually endless assault on his flesh. The boat must have stopped. It was time for them to go.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

“Quick! Don’t be alarmed, I am going to help you!” Yiddek yelled, his voice booming over the top of the encapsulating sound of gunfire. Yiddek slammed down onto the pipe, one of his knees buckling with the force. He’d never been particularly athletic, mental gymnastics being his exercise of choice. The team gained their own footing after the shock wore off and all able bodied members began their onslaught again.

“No shit! Grab him! You’re gonna have to take him all the way up!” Don yelled, lightly nudging the side of Wicksommes thigh as he continued to fire. Yiddek immediately began to inspect the young tank-bearers' condition. He didn’t get far, as he had started at Wicksommes head. He gingerly pulled the wastewalker onto his shoulder and pulled himself up the side of the boat.

“Try to keep him awake!” Yiddek boomed, lightly placing Wicksomme onto the deck and pulling Aldon away from the fight. Aldon tossed Parker his pistol and pulled out a small first aid kit. It wasn’t enough to fix him, not by a long shot, but he might be able to put the pieces back where they were supposed to be. Might.

“I dunno about all that! I might be able to keep him alive though!” Aldon yelled, tending to the young wastewalkers head and jaw. He really didn’t know if there was much he could do. He’d try his best. He pulled Wicksomme up towards the bow of the boat to clear the way for the other members of the team, and began triage.

Parker stayed near the rear of the trip boat, now firing both Aldons pistol and her own. She could swear that each shot found its mark, yet the damn things wouldn’t go down. She could fill an ants skull plate with rounds and still watch it pull itself down the pipe with a barely functioning limbic system. She couldn’t help but miss Doreen, her rifle.

Yiddek dropped down into the pipe again, this time keeping himself upright. Don slapped Mary and Selby on the back of the shoulders, pulling their attention from the quickly reforming line of ants. The explosion may have slowed them down, but the torrent of horrid insects was far from stopping. Wicksommes previous coatings of pesticide were already losing their efficacy.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Yiddek grabbed Mary and Selby, holding them up to the ladder dangling above their heads. The two latched on and clambered up the ladder, Mary taking occasional shots between handholds. Lier continued to fire a few more rounds before letting Yiddek grab him as well. Don fired another few rounds before he instead grabbed onto Yiddeks back and insisted he jump back up to the deck.

Yiddek confusedly obliged, launching himself upwards and landing unsteadily on the vessel. The wastewalkers took to the aft of the boat, continuing to fire down at the swarming ants. Lemmy prepared the singularity generator and pushed the throttle forwards. He input the navigational coordinates Harvel had given him and set the boat into motion.

At least, he meant to. Instead of beginning their steady float towards the singularity he was cre, the vessel simply sat in place. He pushed the throttle again. He pushed another few times, each time the boat registering that it should be moving. He looked behind them. It was Harvel.

The large fungal man had begun reeling himself in with his distended arm, still latched on tight to the side of the boat. Through the flames and corpses the two siblings shot out from behind the line of advancing insects and slid steadily towards the boat.

“Put your ass into it Lemmy! We might have to drag them through with us!” Don shouted, addressing the genius inventor as if he’d known him his whole life. Lemmys brain paused to question what had just occurred but Lemmys instincts slapped his brain across the face and cursed at it.

“I don’t- I don’t think we ca-” Lemmy started, but something had caught his eye. In fact, something had caught the eye of nearly every passenger on board. Darkness enveloped what little space stood between the deck of the boat and the ceiling.

I’m putting an end to this farce.

The voice slammed its way through the minds of every living creature within a five mile radius. Boris was done with his little game. He’d stacked the deck already, it was time to flip the table. As the pair of siblings drew closer a rumble started from above the heads of the team.

It was now or never. Harvel had been consciously pulling Dibbuk and himself towards safety, but Dibbuk was still in the process of waking up. The deep wasn’t something you could just have a cup of coffee and start your day after. It took time for the brain to slow back down.

Harvel began collapsing every available cell within his arm. He pulled them away from the ground, causing them to fly freely through the air. Harvel made momentary eye contact with Yiddek, who readied himself to catch them.

Harvel released his sister from his grasp causing her to barrel full on into Yiddeks chest. The enormous bolter she had been carrying embedded itself into the deck, showering the team in splintered wood. All twelve feet of Harvel slammed into the side of the boat he had been attached to.

With the added momentum the vessel shot forwards and began its journey, straight into the side of the pipe. Lemmy scrambled to fire the singularity engine. The strings of the universe pulled apart, each strand humming with the tension of reality unraveling. The bow of the boat slipped into the portal first, taking two members of the team into the previously unknown along with it.

Between dimensions Wicksomme stared up at the morphing shades of purple and magenta. Aldon had paused his triage for a moment as he checked out the rest of the team for any fatal wounds and was still on the other side of the universe. Selby sat beside the young man, clutching at his chest between ragged breaths. Wicksomme shifted his weight to face the compromised scout. He wasn’t going to take his eyes off of the man for all he was worth.

Harvel unstuck his face from the side of the vessel for just long enough to look up. The rumbling stopped… for a moment. Then, like the finger of some ancient god a pillar of stone and mycelium slammed down through the darkness. It smashed the side of the boat pulling Harvel off and pinning him to the floor of the pipe. The trip boat violently listed to the side he had been latched to, the recently rescued team fighting to stay as such.

Inside the space between Wicksomme and Selby both slammed into the railings on the starboard side of the vessel. Wicksommes strength nearly gave out as he pushed himself back onto the deck. He’d lost a lot of blood.

Selby on the other hand had been flung over the side of the boat, and was barely hanging onto the railing by a single hand. For what good it might do, Wicksomme crawled as fast as he could and grabbed ahold of the scouts collar. He pulled and pulled but no matter the effort he could no longer find the strength.

He stayed there, holding Selby's collar as the man's panicked eyes bored into him. Selby knew he didn’t have the strength. For a moment Wicksomme tried to apologize, but his mouth wouldn’t move. Aldon had wrapped nearly the entire bottom half of his face, leaving room only for his nostrils. Selby’s eyes flickered.

Where before there had been fear, or panic, or sorrow now there was nothing. Then anger, burning anger of hundreds of years came over them. He smiled. Dread filled Wicksommes being, a chill reaching from the pit of his stomach to the tips of his fingers. What little blood he had left ran cold.

“Telio was wrong, you wouldn’t have lived anyway!” Selby’s body growled. Wicksomme, for reasons he couldn’t explain, took an extremely deep breath. Selby’s hand gripped his collar and pulled. Wicksomme fought as best he could but his strength once again failed him. Boris pulled himself and Selby up, and in doing so yanked Wicksomme over the railing.

As the young man flew into the unknown he caught one last glimpse of Selby. He’d pulled himself the rest of the way onto the railing, his face still contorted in rage. His eyes blinked back from white hot anger, to panic, fear, and confusion.

‘What is this feeling?’ Wicksomme wondered. The purple tendrils that could pull and shape the fabric of reality wound their way around Wicksommes eyes, and face. He could feel them worming their way into the back of his suit, pulling the dense fibers apart like yarn. Something touched Lombards spine, and he lost consciousness for a final time.