Deep Rock Equestria: Into The Abyss

by The Atlantean

5. [Rainbow Dash] Salted Omelets, Part 1

Full Mission Roll:
4 Eggs, 12 Gunk Seeds, Haz 3, Salt Pits
Warning: Parasites, Anomaly: Golden Bugs
Machine Event: Omen Modular Exterminator
Extra Resources: Error Cube x1
Roll System in Phase 2 at this point

Rainbow Dash boarded the Drop Pod early to check on her minigun. She’d gotten herself a stability upgrade after the Morkite run (since it was the only one she had the crafting resources to get) and wanted to make sure it was installed. Sure enough, a small image on the massive gun indicated that the upgrade was indeed equipped.

“Mahty early, aren’t ya, Rainbow?”

Rainbow whipped her head around, but it was only Applejack. She relaxed.

“Yeah, I guess so. Twilight got our upgrades in last night.”

“Ah’ll bet.” Applejack checked her own gear. “Looks like she got me the range increase. Ah’d have gone for the ammo, but Ah don’t have any Enor Pearls, whatever those are.”

“Probably just like Jadiz and Bismor. Gotta find them down in the caves.”

“You ready to go back down?”

Rainbow grimaced. “Not really, but there’s some sweet upgrades for the armor rig I wanna try out. Need Enor Pearls and Croppa, though.” She brushed a speck of dust from her armor and tried to smile. “Mission Control says we’re collecting eggs today.”

“Sounds like you’ve read the whole briefing. Come on, let’s eat first.”

Rainbow smirked and followed Applejack to the Abyss Bar, where Pinkie Pie was stacking more pancakes than Rarity had fabrics on a single plate.

“I can’t eat that, Pinkie! You can’t even reach the top!”

“You’re not supposed to, silly. Yours are right here,” Pinkie chirped, producing several plates of pancakes and setting them on the counter. “Whatcha girls doing today?”

“Egg Hunt in the Salt Pits,” Rainbow replied through a mouthful of pancake. “Mission Control said our cave’s Haz Level is ‘Dangerous’, and we’ve got a warning, too. I forgot what it is, but it’ll boost our Hazard Bonus by like 15%!” She laughed. “Golden Bugs, too. That’s apparently a thing that can happen.”

“That a warning?” Applejack asked.

“Nope, that’s the Anomaly. There also might be some pre-deployed stuff down there, too, that we can find. I can’t wait to see what’s up!”

“Sounds like you got your hands full. Good luck!” Pinkie smiled, as she always did, and bounced her way into the kitchen.

“How about we wake up Sunset and Rarity and get down there?” Rainbow asked. “The sooner we go, the sooner we get back.”

“Nah, give them an hour. Ah think they’re still a little shook.”

Rainbow snorted. She’d been knocked out the day before. Sunset and Rarity had nothing on her. But she wasn’t about to barge in on them, so she contented herself with pancakes.

---------------------------------

“Egg-collection time, team. Alien eggs. The company wants them--don’t ask why. Find them, stow them in Molly, and return. Simple.”

Rainbow laughed and hefted her minigun, feeling the massive weight stretch her arms like rubber bands. Twilight promised at breakfast that a lighter model specifically for her would be ready by the time she got back. Finally, she’d be able to actually carry the thing around, and although it wouldn’t be better than the standard-issue one, it certainly wouldn’t be worse.

Sunset’s aloud reading of the mission briefing on the way down from orbit made sure everyone was on the same page. Even though every bug they killed would explode into units of gold they could pick up and store in Molly, there were bugs inside the bugs. “Parasites,” the briefing called the warning. Rainbow snorted. It probably wasn’t even that bad.

The pod clanked to a stop and crashed down to the salt-white floor of the red-walled caves of the Salt Pits, known for their salt crystals (which, although generally worthless, apparently tasted great on Glyphid omelets) and abundant deposits of Enor Pearls.

Sunset was first out, firing her grapple gun to zip to the wall in front of them. Applejack went down the ramp at a light jog, and Rarity bounded after her with an energy usually only seen in Pinkie Pie. Rainbow lugged her giant weapon off the ramp and threw a flare.

Once Molly disembarked, the pod began its ascent back to the surface, leaving them down in the dark abyss that was the Hoxxes underground. Their starting room was pretty empty aside from a column or two, with no minerals to be found. A couple light purple sac-like things hung from the ceiling.

“What are those things?” Rarity asked, using her laser pointer to indicate one of the sacs. “My pointer says it’s a… Gunk Seed?”

“We need to get twelve for our secondary objective,” Sunset said. She aimed her rifle at the seed Rarity had pointed out.

“Darling, I don’t think that’s the best--”

BAM! Sunset’s bullet shattered the outer coating, revealing a large spherical seed that fell to the ground. Upon hitting the floor, it compressed slightly and rolled a bit, but didn’t really bounce. She aimed at a second seed and fired again, reloading once she’d cleared the room of Gunk Seeds.

Applejack picked up one of the seeds, grunting as her hands found the best way to grasp the awkwardly large sphere. “This is a lot heavier than it looks,” she said.

Rarity picked up another and nearly collapsed, forcing Rainbow to catch it before it rolled over her prone friend. It really was heavier than she thought. She let Applejack take it to Molly, watching Sunset head on down a small passage while they dealt with the seeds.

Moments after Sunset disappeared, a scream echoed off the walls. Rainbow ran as fast as she could and ran straight into the girl as she sprinted back up to the group. She fell back a bit, but Sunset practically tumbled down the slope--and into the horde of Glyphids crawling up to meet them.

There wasn’t any time to think. Rainbow pulled her trigger and heard the familiar wind-up whirr as her minigun started up. Bullets streamed from the end of her barrel and into the crowd, hitting bugs and rock alike and barely missing Sunset as she scrambled around the fire. Rainbow glanced at her heat gauge. One more second… She stopped shooting and threw a grenade at the swarm of bugs.

The grenade stuck itself to the wall and beeped for a second, then exploded, injuring all the bugs caught in the blast. Some of them died, and a bunch of smaller bugs crawled out of their corpses with just as much vigor.

A stream of flame burst from Rainbow’s peripheral vision, turning all the little bugs and many of the bigger ones into burnt, crispy husks blackened by fire. Applejack whooped. Rarity shot a Glyphid Grunt that got too close. Sunset, recovered from the initial scare, swung her pickaxe at a little bug, which exploded into a gold nugget.

Eventually, the action slowed enough for Rainbow to pull out a water bottle and take a big, refreshing gulp.

“You okay, Sunset?” she asked.

Sunset nodded, but the sick look on her face said differently. She ran up to the starting room.

“Carnivorous Larvae,” Rarity read from her bestiary. “They will burrow into anything biological given half a chance and multiply aggressively once they’ve found a nice nest.” She blanched, her skin turning a sickly shade of green. “Let’s hope we don’t have any in us when we head back to the Space Rig.”

“You said it,” Applejack agreed, reloading her flamethrower. “How about we get this done with as soon as Sunset’s ready?”

Rainbow Dash couldn’t agree more. The “Parasite” warning was definitely worse than she thought. Remembering that there was a “Golden Bugs” anomaly, too, she checked her mineral bag. It was nearly full of gold.

“Guys, every bug we kill gives us gold! That’s so awesome!”

“Even so,” Rarity said, “I don’t want to be down here longer than I need. Just the idea of parasites disgusts me.” She shivered and reloaded her gun.

“Y’alright, sugar cube?” Applejack called up the tunnel.

Sunset walked slowly back into view and into the tunnel. “Yeah. I’m good.”

“You don’t look like it,” Rarity commented. “Let’s finish this mission as quickly as possible.”

Applejack took the lead with Rainbow right behind her. Rarity and Sunset brought up the rear, Molly followed them at a distance through the tunnel. It wound around and zigzagged somewhat, which was annoying, but it at least didn’t have any bugs in it. Sunset took care of the one gold vein they came across, and Rarity platformed her way to a chunk of Nitra.
Rainbow watched the walls for anything of interest.

“Y’all might wanna take a look at this,” Applejack said.

Rainbow Dash jogged over to Applejack, and her jaw dropped as Sunset fired a flare across the cavern. The place was huge! Hundreds of little red stalactites hung from a ceiling probably a hundred feet above their heads, with clusters of white ones scattered about. Some white crystals even glowed, and all sorts of rock was scattered around the room. Several root-covered purplish bulbs were around, too: four in total dotted the walls.

Sunset was already on the other side of the room on one of Rarity’s platforms by the time Rainbow Dash shook her head and looked joined Applejack by a marker. The girl was carrying a big pearl from a pit she’d dug in the floor.

“What’s that?”

“An Enor Pearl, Ah think.” Applejack dumped the pearl and the contents of her mineral bag into Molly. “Say, ya mahnd gettin’ whatever’s behind those weird-lookin’ crystals over there?” She pointed at a cluster of black crystals embedded in the wall with a pulsing white glow.

“Sure. Where do you think the eggs are?”

“Probably in those pulsatin’ things on the wall. Looks like Sunset’s gonna find out in a second. Hurry up.”

Rainbow lugged her minigun over to the group of crystals and swung her pickaxe at the rock. A chunk crumbled away every second swing, and eventually, she unearthed a strange cube… thing. She picked it up. It was hot to the touch, but not unbearably so through her gloves, and shaped like a black Rubix Cube. she turned it over in her hand to get a different angle and cocked her head.

She brought it back to Molly and Applejack. “Hey, do you know what the heck this thing is?” she asked.

“No, Ah don’t. Dump it in Molly, and we’ll see.”

Rainbow shrugged and deposited her minerals. The heads-up display in her headset lit up with new information.

“E-R-R-colon-slash-slash-twenty-three-uh, thingy… Y-percent sign-slash,” She read. “What the heck does that even mean?”

A deep, distant roar of anguish and distress echoed off the cavern walls, shaking the floor and nearly making Rainbow lose her balance. Once it ended, she regained a steady footing and looked around. Applejack seemed to have had a similar experience.

“What was that?”

“Ah don’t know, but it didn’t sound good.”

Moments later, a flare fired across the cavern, illuminating a small swarm of bugs crawling towards where Sunset and Rarity were. Rarity’s shotgun fired. The dancing dwarf appeared. The bugs seemed to converge on the platform Sunset was on.

“Rarity, catch!” Sunset yelled, and tossed a large yellowish egg-shaped thing with reddish-purple veins all over it.

Rarity dutifully caught the object as Sunset grappled closer and threw it back at her with all her might.

“Darnit, Rainbow, help me out here!” Applejack shouted as her flamethrower lit the nearby area with a beautiful orange flame.

Rainbow Dash turned around and hosed a group of Glyphid Grunts approaching from behind her, taking care to ensure she got the parasites that burst from them, too. She whooped and let the minigun wind back down as the bugs crumpled, turning around to see Sunset and Rarity make it back with the thing they’d unearthed.

“Is that an egg?” Rainbow asked.

“Probably,” Sunset replied as she deposited it into Molly. “Yup. Just three more to go. Let’s get those Gunk Seeds up there, too.” She fired a flare into the ceiling and shot some seeds down.

As the girls dumped the seeds and other minerals from the room into their robotic minecart, Mission Control called out, “Contact! A swarm of Glyphid Grunts is heading your way! They’re almost onto you--get ready!”

“Son of a…” Rainbow growled.

“Secondary objective completed. Fine job.”

“Well, that’s nice,” Rarity said as Sunset fired another flare into the ceiling.

Applejack threw down a resupply beacon.

“Supply drop has been ordered, and is on the way,” Mission Control said.

The seconds seemed to tick by at an excruciatingly slow pace. The resupply pod drilled through the earth, dropping to the ground nearby with a loud clank and extended its supply leaves.

“The Glyphid Grunts are here! Let’s show them our special handshake, team.”

Applejack pushed a new canister into her flamethrower. Sunset spun her rifle. Rarity leveled her sights with grim determination. Rainbow Dash spun her minigun barrels and smirked. It was time to show these bugs who ruled the caves of Hoxxes.

Author's Note:

I'd say they're getting more and more confident in their abilities and teamwork as they do more missions and encounter more situations. Might come to bite them later, but who knows?

ERR://23¤Y%/ is a very interesting thing.

Comments

[Valiant Charge]

I still don't know what those cubes are

[The Atlantean]

11154094
None of us do, really.

[TheNesredep]

11154100
It give a bonus XP. It has no craft able use.

[The Atlantean]

11260045
I know that. The base value is 2000. But beyond that, what are they? That's the question we can't answer.

[Cheshirek4t]

11260082
And it's the question that matters too
Sadly i don't think DRG is gonna become lore-y anytime soon

[Phara_mine]

Getting cube on their 3rd mission is some great luck all things considered.