//------------------------------// // Chapter 103: Down The Rabbit Hole // Story: We don't go to Sub-Level Five // by RadBunny //------------------------------// Astral wasn’t sure what was real anymore. The hallucinations had progressed rapidly. Sometimes he saw the monster, other times it vanished in a puff of smoke. He treated it all as hostile- running rather than fighting. A shotgun blast would alert the real creature anyhow. It was maddening. He was still sane, fully aware that his mind was not interpreting the world correctly…but the stallion was powerless to stop it. The first few images had been easy to dismiss. The next dozen too. But now they were everywhere. Even the environment was changing, and Astral’s thoughts were muddled and clouded. His body was bathed in what felt like buckets of sweat, his limbs trembling from the constant running and fear. Sassi, or the hallucination of her, was now a constant. Always at the edge of his vision. Begging for mercy, for help. Other times, she was mocking him. Laughing at his weakness. Things the real Sassi would never do. Right? I’m still sane. ….aren’t I? If the clock was right, he had been running in this gas for…how long? An hour? No. Two? Maybe three? He wasn’t sure, but it was breaking him. Sounds above him, the scratching of bugs in the suit, coupled with the occasional siren that haunted his nightmares was too much. Reality had blended with hallucinations some time ago. It took every ounce of effort just to try and navigate the maze around obstacles that may or may not even exist. His head pounded, Astral struggling to focus as he searched for a way out. He must have passed each area by at least a dozen times, wandering and hiding. The thoughts in his mind were clouded, and that just made it easier for him to focus on the false scenes in front of him. They weren’t real, were they? Sidestepping a pool of bubbling acid, Astral wasn’t taking any chances. The jeering bones of his special somepony laughed at him from the green goo. His family then joined her, lunging at him from the acid as flesh melted from their bones. The stallion’s limbs trembled, nearly buckling as the Thestral struggled to control his breathing. The hacking laughter of Sassi reverberated in his ears, despite the HUD not reading any auditory cues. It’s not real. It can’t be. That thought only had gotten him so far. He could feel the heat from a fire that blasted out from a wall, and the chill from a cloud of liquid nitrogen that jetted from a burst ceiling tile. The apparitions of Sassi had recently started to yank at him if he got too close, trying to draw him into their skeletal embrace. Even Gabbro wasn’t spared, the hippogriff choking on his own blood as his mangled body fell out from behind a corner as Astral passed. Maybe it is real. In a way. I don’t know. For the tenth time, what he thought was an exit ramp turned out to be a blank wall. The apparition vanished as soon as he got close enough to touch it. This time, Sassi had been waving at him from the ‘exit’. Tears trickled from Astral’s eyes as he forced himself to walk. Now, a torn-up version of Sassi was lying on the ground as he trotted by, begging him to stop. To wait. To help her. Please don’t be real. It was a thought he begged with all his heart to be true. He wasn’t sure how much longer he wandered. Astral was barely able to hide when the creature showed up. Oddly, it seemed more intent on stalking him. Maybe. Was it real? Another apparition of Sassi, this time with a broken leg, begged him for help as the stallion walked by. His hooves were made of lead. Why was he so tired? Astral’s mind ran in circles, struggling to make sense of it all. The horrific sights and sounds were all-encompassing. His family and friends melting into a gory pile as they screamed, begging for help. He just needed to get out! But how? The stallion’s limbs trembled, alien sounds and sights overwhelming him as Astral closed his eyes. He could only block out so much. The sensation of being buried underneath bodies that poured from the ceiling. The slimy texture as they melted around him left nothing but bones to crunch under an armored hoof. And when he opened his eyes, the horrors hadn’t changed, the Thestral forcing his way through the horrific pile of corpses. All while the siren in his ears screamed in warning. The HUD couldn’t be correct. The readouts were all over the place, changing every time the stallion looked. One thing that did stay the same was his vitals, all redlined as the system spat out nonsensical information. He ducked into a locker to catch his breath. The motion tracker showed a moving dot, but it seemed to lie to him half the time. It was the half where it was true that made Astral’s skin crawl. A familiar foe crept into view, black flesh glistening underneath the fluorescent lights. A long neck turned slowly, the head of the creature examining everywhere carefully. A soft, seemingly amused laugh echoed all around. “Who’s there?” The creature’s mouth didn’t move when uttering the words. The dagger-like teeth were barred in a wide grimace, standing out against the shadowy, leathery skin. It crept off with a soft laugh, seeming to enjoy the hunt. Astral’s legs failed him. The stallion slid down against the metal locker, lungs desperately sucking in the poisonous air. His head pounded, and a few tears welled up in his eyes as Sassi now walked around the corner. Her legs were in shreds, the mare crying out for help. As if it would muffle her cries, Astral clamped his armored hooves over his head. A cold sweat made the inside of the suit slippery, the armor feeling somehow heavier. He forced himself out, looking away from Sassi as she tottered towards him. It was barely a shred of sanity that Astral clung to, but as slight as it was, it endured. “You,” Sassi growled, glaring at the dead creature under her hoof, “are the ugliest coconut I’ve ever seen!” She smashed the mostly-dead scout with a hoof, the black tentacles spasming once before stilling. Its host body had surprised her as it slid across a wall. That’s when Sassi had found they could, in fact, see. Well, at least sense nearby creatures somehow. The twelve skeletal, coconut-like scouts had launched at her, but as with a prior encounter, the mare had quickly found out that an armored punch made them explode like a water balloon. At least, that was after a bit of resistance from the thin, boney exoskeleton. The host creature had met an equally nasty end with a knife thrust. Thankfully, there hadn’t been a sign of Number Two since the initial encounter. It was also heartening to know it was fighting against their current foes. That’d occupy it at least for a bit. The mare had traversed a massive room; at least thrice the size of a hoofball stadium. It was generally rectangular in structure, but there hadn’t been any entrances! She had spent the past two hours walking in a complete circle, dodging various enemies as they clambered around the exterior tunnels. The number of mutant creatures had slowly increased, the mare only fighting if she had to. Oddly, they didn’t seem to pick up that she stayed in the same area. The Squirmies and larger mutants only came in pairs or one at a time. She’d killed at least a dozen of each, and the guns were running low on ammunition. She was about ready to start digging into the air duct system herself. There had to be an entrance she missed! The air had begun to smell rather foul after the toxin alert, but other than that, she hadn’t noticed any significant effects over the hours. The mare paused, hearing a series of whispers behind her. Strike that. It wasn’t the first time that had happened. Yet the AI audio revealed no such sounds. That left two alternatives. One, it was in her head like the hive-mind link was, and something was probing her. Or two, the gas was a hallucinogen, and it had managed to affect her over the past hours. Neither option was rather palatable. But Sassi assumed it was the latter. Thankfully, being resistant to nasty chemicals, in general, was part of the soldier program. Occasional whispers for the past hour weren’t too bad. I just hope Astral is ok.