Null
Null moved fast.
He hadn't been focusing, and he cursed himself for it. It had cost him precious seconds; he gave the psychological command to activate the GRX implant, but it was too late - the creature already had a hold of Terrence. The man screamed, but by then, the synthetic hyper-adrenaline was sweeping through Null's system, cutting off all emotion, heightening every sensation to its peak.
It was then that he saw the abomination in all its glory. An enormous monstrosity, as tall as the cave roof, a slithering mass of bleeding pustules and writhing elongated tongues, human arms scrabbling at the ground beneath it to drag its bloated weight forward. He could barely even tell where its maw began and ended, hundreds of twisted and distorted razor-edged teeth gnashing out of time with each other, massive insectoid tentacle-limbs tearing at the walls. Its skin was covered in cracked scabs hardened to form armour plates, some half-hanging off, revealing flayed, diseased skin underneath; bulges covered every inch of its horrific body, gigantic tumours that bled out acid liquids that steamed and smoked at its skin. Its face might have once been human, now grotesque and distorted in an endless scream; mixed in with the disgusting sound of the dripping beast slicking its way across the ground was a high-pitched, broken roar, human distorted by something that was fundamentally inhuman.
Gazing upon it was as though gazing upon something man was not meant to ever witness. Every time he looked at a component of it, his eyes were dragged elsewhere, to another horrific feature; he could not see it in its entirety, could not conceive of every single part of it. Nothing he had ever witnessed - Ghouls, Super Mutants, Centaurs, anything - came remotely close to the sheer existential terror he felt at gazing upon this entity. His heightened senses made every smell choking, every scream ear-splitting, every image in ultra-high-definition.
Bones snapped like gunfire as the abomination dragged Terrence into its gaping maw, and the man screamed again, louder this time. Null felt the tiniest twinge inside of him; like a distant knowledge that he had long forgotten, a ghost of a memory of a feeling. He ignored it. There was nothing he could do now.
He snapped his fingers at Frederica, the robot sitting at the mouth of the cave, and the lumbering beast of a machine started dutifully marching out of the cave, completely unwitting as to the nightmare it was escaping. Null felt the razor-edged tip of what looked to be a giant scorpion tail slash above him, slamming into the wall, showering him in dust; another slash grazed his shoulder as he leapt to the side, tearing off the left shoulder plate and upper bicep covering of his reinforced leather armour; the movement seemed effortless on the part of the beast, the creature wielding unimaginable strength at its beck and call; even full power armour might not be able to stand up to a blow from that thing.
Something wet and squishy splattered in front of him, and he felt his lighting-quick thought processes freeze for a second when he realised that it was a leg, blood spurting from it, tendons and shattered bone hanging loose from ragged flesh. He glanced behind him, seeing Terrence bleeding profusely and screaming horrifically as he desperately fumbled with a bottlecap mine; another tentacle slammed down on his solar plexus, and Terrence's scream changed pitch. Null's mind automatically narrated -
Left lung punctured; stomach crushed and burst. Left kidney crippled. Chances of survival - 15%. A second later, another strike to Terrence's right chest - Scapula shattered, all major left shoulder ligaments torn through, right lung crushed, heart received lethal impact shock. Chances of survival - 3%.
Then the entity bit down.
All major organs below upper chest critically damaged. Nervous system rendered inoperable. Skeleton crushed beyond use. Chances of survival -
Zero.
That was it. Without giving it another moment's hesitation, Null turned and just ran. He dropped his subcarbine, grasping Bandit by the back of her collar and dragging her away on instinct; she barely slowed him down, and he could swear he could hear her cackling. Glancing down at her, his mind denoted - Potential psychological break - investigate further. Rock shrapnel impact in left leg - non-serious. A monster he was, without question, but he was trained to never kill anyone if he didn't have to - if nothing else, it had the potential to lead to complications down the road. And he was not going to let anyone die like that. Well, almost no-one.
A tiny, distant, twisted part of him wondered if he could somehow bring one of those things up to Nova Scotia.
He rocketed out of the dark cave, emerging into the sandstorm; he didn't care in the slightest, just moving away as fast as he could. He caught up to Frederica, who was making a surprisingly decent pace - the repairs he and Terrence did must have held. Thinking back, he felt another tiny twinge inside of him.
He turned.
Within the dark mouth of the cave, Terrence was still screaming. Null pulled his sidearm from his holster, the whole world still in slow-motion because of the GRX flowing through his system, raising it slowly to eye-level. With cold eyes, his finger curled around the trigger.
At the last moment, through the haze of sand and the dark of the cave, he could swear he saw Terrence mouthing something -
"Tell Roland I said fuck you."
A single, booming gunshot later, and Terrence's screaming stopped.
Another few moments passed as Null turned and grabbed Bandit, looping one arm under her to support her and making a fast jog north-bound. He didn't care where he was going, not in the slightest, just so long as it was away from the cave. The lumbering machine somehow managed to keep pace next to them, trotting along happily, blissfully unaware of what had just transpired. He heard a blast behind them, followed by a massive crashing of stone - a glance confirmed that the cave had collapsed. He breathed a silent thanks to Terrence. Even in his final moments, the young man had managed to save Null and Bandit.
There was that twinge again.
Eventually, he ducked into a small recess in the ground, out of the wind and the sand; it was barely deep and wide enough to hold the two of them, but it would do. The GRX had long ago worn off, and he slumped against the wall, feeling completely drained, his left upper arm pulsing with pain; a glance confirmed blood dripping down it. He didn't care. He was alive, and momentarily safe. That was all that counted.
"Status," he said coldly and matter-of-factly to Bandit. He didn't care about being polite now. Didn't care about anything, except staying alive and breathing.