5-TODD

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Trembling, I walked towards the armory and grabbed an energy cutter. I found the longest, strongest cable we had for the winch and clipped one end of it to my suit. I then entered the airlock and opened a video feed to the cockpit where Jeff was. After ten hours of flying through subspace, we made it to Jurakos, and found our target using probes. Now came the part we both dreaded most, getting the flower off the creature’s head.

“You sure about this, Todd?” Jeff asked me, looking worried.

I could barely keep the cutter steady in my flippers and I thought I was going to hyperventilate long before I jumped out of the ship. The plan was nuts. I’d jump out of the ship using a winch, Jeff would lower me down, I’d snatch the flower, and he’d pull me back inside. Even though it was my idea, half of me yelled at the other half, warning how terrible this was.

I shook my head, “no, not really.”

“I think we’re in the right spot. Just don’t fall.”

“Right…” I said, feeling like my heart was going to explode.

I set up the winch and then opened the other end of the airlock. I also activated the energy barrier for the suit to protect me from potential contamination. The air alone was so toxic it could kill us in under a minute. Dangers included parasitic flies that lay eggs in your skin, lakes of acid so potent, they could dissolve starships, and man-eating plants. Those were the common ways to die. I then turned my attention to the creature.

I think Aurora was underselling the sheer size of it. It felt a lot bigger than three-hundred feet. I am confident in saying it was nearly twice that. Its back resembled a mountain biome with towering trees and a spine-like ridge running down it. Then I saw the face. Take a Venus Fly Trap and cross that with a giant crocodile and give it six rows of teeth. Its skin was dark green with lighter patches here and there. Tightly interwoven vines made up the “skin” and “muscles” of the gargantuan creature.

Its entire blob-shaped body was drooping over, giving the appearance of being asleep. As I watched from above, I noticed thick leaves that looked like armor covering the stomach area. Dense clouds of pollen from the other plants growing on this creature swirled around us as Jeff brought the ship closer. The setting sun to my right almost blinded me as I realized what I was about to do.

I spotted the giant flower; its orange petals were larger than me! A subtle glow emitted from them and long spiraling tentacles emerged from the center. Looking at it, I opened a communication channel with Aurora and turned on the suit’s camera, allowing her to see it.

“Um…how much do we need?” I asked.

“At least three full petals, and do you notice the bulbs on the tentacles?” Aurora said.

“Please don’t tell me you need those?” I replied, feeling my stomach sink.

“Okay, I won’t.”

“Oh nah bro,” Jeff said.

“I only need one bulb, but if you can get both, that would be best,” Aurora remarked. “Whatever you do, don’t wake it up. Its acid will eat through your ship.”

I wasn’t planning on doing that.

“I don’t need anymore ship repair bills!” Edgy growled.

“Doubt she’ll be too happy with you stealing it,” Aurora said.

“She?” I asked.

“Yeah, that one’s a female. I can tell by the smaller red flowers on the back of the head.”

I had a bit of a drop before I could reach the giant egg-shaped pods. They pulsed with subtle orange lights, like signals for air traffic control or bombs priming for detonation. Why did I think bomb, of all things? That just made me shake even more.

“Hey Todd,” Aurora suddenly said, making me jump.

“Y-yes?”

“Good luck.”

“T-t-t-thanks,” I said.

I took a deep breath and peered off the edge. I’m not good with heights. Legs wobbling, I considered not doing this. The thought of running and asking Jeff to do it flooded my mind. Every part of my being shouted that this was a terrible idea. But I thought about it. What would Edgy do in this scenario? Knowing him, if I were the one dying and needing this plant, he would’ve jumped out the ship thirty seconds ago without hesitation. I had to do the same.

“You good Todd?” Jeff asked.

“Y-y-yeah…lemme just…”

“You sound nervous,” Aurora said, “more nervous than usual.”

“I…I don’t do so well with heights.”

Even though he didn’t say it, I heard Edgy telling me to butch up and do this. Taking a deep breath, I grabbed the cutter. Jumping off, the wind whipped at my face. I had to fight back the urge to scream as fear and adrenaline flooded my system and I felt all the force being exerted on me traveling up my legs. The sensation of falling always made my skin crawl. I couldn’t hear anything over the roaring winds. Then it halted, and I hovered right above the giant bulb. The harness slammed into my chest. It felt like an angry, roided-up bodybuilder who thought I had insulted his mother punched me. I couldn’t breathe and my lungs felt like they had been lit on fire. Looking at the pod, I could see my trembling reflection in it.

“Get it Todd!” Jeff shouted.

“O-okay,” I whispered as I armed the cutter. “Bring me a little closer,” I told him.

Looking at the bulb, I hoped this thing wouldn’t feel me doing this. I activated the cutter and a blade of crackling blue energy shot from the end of the tool. I grabbed the top of the bulb and cut at the stalk’s base. Embers flew off the thick stalk as the blade passed through. The minute the blade sliced through, I wrapped my flippers around the bulb. I underestimated its heaviness. It felt like it would drag me to the ground and break the cable. My arms burned as I struggled to keep my grip.

“Pull me up!” I shouted, as I felt like I was about to drop it.

The winch started yanking me up about as fast as I fell. It forced all the air from my lungs and sent jolts of pain through my arms as I carried the bulb about the size of a large watermelon. Pulled back into the ship, I collided with cold metal, unintentionally releasing the bulb and slamming it into the door behind me with a loud thud. The sharp pain in my back just above the tailbone made me cough and wheeze. I couldn’t grunt in pain. I lacked the air.

“You good man?” Jeff asked a few seconds later.

“No! You didn’t need to pull that fast!”

“Oops, my bad bro, I thought the red button was the normal retract.”

“No, that’s the emergency one! Use the yellow button!”

“Oh, I see, sorry, dude. You wanna try for the other bulb or go for the petals?”

I looked at the giant bulb and thought about it. Knowing our luck, we’d need both. I told Jeff to lower me again. As I was getting into position, the entire beast swayed a bit. It sounded like a bunch of shifting rocks. My heart skipped a beat and all my feathers stood up on ends. I was screaming in my head, begging it to not wake up. A chilling, paralyzing fear invaded my heart. I held my breath and waited, but it didn’t move again.

“I think it’s just shifting in its sleep,” Jeff said. “I think we’re good.”

I exhaled and cut the bulb free and Jeff pulled me up, without knocking the wind out of me this time. Now to get the petals.

I jumped out of the ship again, but I couldn’t reach the ground. I was still a couple of stories from the base, dangling there.

“What’s wrong?” I asked Jeff.

“We out of cable, dude.”

“Can you bring the ship down?”

“Uh…sure, lemme see how low I can get. Not a lot of space here with those big ass trees.”

I looked around. He was right. A ton of trees surrounded the flower and their branches jutted out in crazy patterns. I had no idea if those trees connected to the plant’s central nervous system or not, and I wasn’t keen on finding out.

“Lower the ship down slowly,” I said.

“You got it.”

Jeff lowered the ship, and brought me closer to the ground, but not yet there. I looked up. The ship neared the top of the trees.

“That good?” Jeff asked.

“N-no, you have to get lower,” I said.

“Lower? Alright, I’ll try man.”

He lowered the ship closer to the treetops, causing the leaves to rustle. Thankfully, the plant was still silent. I was just within reach of the petals. I holstered the cutter and grabbed the tip of the flower petal, pulling as hard as I could.

It wasn’t budging.

I tried again and heard a rip. Suddenly, the petal came off, throwing me back and causing me to strike a tree. My body went stiff as I felt the entire area shake. Then I heard a booming snarl and the ground a few inches below me shifted. Bits of rocks slid down the creature. Next thing I heard was a roar so loud it shook both me and the ship.

“Aw shit! She’s waking up!” Jeff yelled.

That was the last thing I wanted to hear. I couldn’t keep still. Then I saw giant vines slithering through the forest. They ended in large teeth and came at me like angry vipers.

“P-p-pull me up!” I shouted.

No response. The ship trembled, and I saw six long interlinked vines coming towards me. The closest one opened its mouth and out came a jet of dark acid. Our ship jerked and the acid spray missed, but hit the tree behind me, making the bark bubble and warp. Smoke billowed from it as if doused in lava.

“Jeff! Pull me-!”

The ship sailed high into the air. I thought I was safe from the vines. I was so wrong. They lunged even faster than before, spewing jets of acid. I shut my eyes and looked away, expecting to be melted. Suddenly, I flew to the left, and I opened my eyes and looked up. The Jurakian Devil Plant was looking at us and snarling. I felt that snarl reverberating through my bones as I tried to breathe. The winds slapped me in the face as I hung from the bottom of the ship several hundred feet above the ground.

“Now what, bro? Do we shoot it!?” Jeff asked.

“No! You might damage the plant!” I shouted over the howling winds.

Long vines flew from its body towards us and yes; they vomited more acid. Jeff tried to evade them but they had a longer reach than I thought, and I had the worst view as I held onto the petal for dear life while vines snapped and lunged at me. A glob of acid overshot me but hit the side of the Vermillion. Watching, I saw it eat the hull, getting smoke in my face and scalding my eyes. The harsh, chemical smell reminded me of fresh paint and almost made me vomit.

I then heard a rumble from the main body. The entire creature tilted its head back into the air and its stomach balloon.

“What’s it doing now!?” Jeff asked.

Before I could say anything, it spat up a giant pillar of black acid high into the air. It rained down around the creature, covering a massive area. Unfortunately, we were in that area. Acid rain struck the ship and started melting through the armor.

“Pull me in! Pull me in!” I screamed.

The ship rocked. As Jeff retreated, I heard a loud bang, and I saw flames erupt from a thruster. Next thing I knew, we spun as if caught in a tornado. As the world became a whirling blur, I couldn’t see. I couldn’t breathe, as the harness threatened to shatter my ribs and crush my internal organs. I felt nauseous.

“Something’s wrong! I gotta put this ship down!” Jeff shouted.

Before I could beg him to pull me inside again, the cable yanked me in and I crashed into the back of the ship. The airlock closed behind me while I cradled the petal. As the ship continued to spin and my heart raced, I rested in fetal position by the door.

“Hold on to something, dude! We going down!”

Less than a second later, the ship bucked and launched me several feet into the air. I came crashing down onto the cold metallic floor, hitting the back of my head so hard my brain went numb. The ship trembled several more times, and I heard multiple loud snaps. We must’ve been hitting the trees. After several seconds of hitting things, the ship stopped, and I flew towards the opposite end of the room and hit the door, arm first. I screamed in pain as it felt like someone had just clubbed my arm with an anvil. While the ship gently lowered like it was docking, I examined my bruised arm to confirm it wasn’t broken. Somehow, it wasn’t. Despite our landing, the spinning sensation persisted and intensified upon standing. I unhooked the cable and grabbed the bulbs and dragged them further into the ship. Turning in the captain’s seat, Jeff scratched the back of his head with a nervous expression.

“How bad is it?” I asked while grabbing some pain medication.

Jeff winced and stepped away from the console, “uh…you tell me.”

My state of distress escalated further, if that was even possible. I almost collapsed before I even made it to Edgy’s seat. I struggled to breathe. The air felt thinner and my body shook as my heart pounded as if I had been running on a soccer field. I couldn’t keep my flippers steady as I got into the chair and began diagnostics.

“Please tell me you two did not fuck up my ship!?” Edgy growled, coughing while he did.

I checked the diagnostics. This bird couldn’t fly in its current condition. A horrific sense of failure crept in. Then I saw the automated repair routines firing. They had diagnosed the problem and were working to fix it. We would just have to wait.

“Auto repair can fix the damage, but it’s going to take two hours,” I said to Edgy.

“Oh great! That’s just what I needed! More repair bills!” Edgy hissed.

“Well, what now?” Jeff asked.

“The Jurakian Devil Plant has their own language,” Aurora said. “Most translators can install a patch for them. It’s a long shot but, you could always ask nicely. Or try to climb up its back and get the other petals without getting melted.”

I wondered who was crazy enough to learn and translate the language of a hostile plant monster that devours everything. I wasn’t liking our options, but maybe talking to it would be the better move. Although she likely wasn’t in a talking mood, especially after I cut off two bulbs and ripped out a petal without permission. I realized we would not get very far if we tried stealing the flower, especially with the creature now active and looking for us. Bringing that back without it killing us seemed impossible.

“Okay, let’s try asking it nicely,” I said.

“And what if she doesn’t want to talk?” Jeff asked.

“Uh… I don’t know? Maybe we can kill it with the Vermillion when it’s repaired,” I suggested.

Jeff shrugged. I went into the armory, which is jammed packed with weapons. I don’t even know how much stuff is in here. It used to be even bigger, but we lost over half of it during the Callisto Incident. I found the translator and an energy rifle. The translator resembled a giant megaphone with a screen. I then grabbed a black and purple visor that had a HUD program installed complete with eye tracking to make aiming easier. After a brief boot-up, the software conducted a full system check before loading the UI. While I tinkered with that, Jeff grabbed an enormous weapon with a cone shaped barrel, a sonic cannon. Jeff shoved in the battery pack for it and I grabbed as many energy cells as I could. I activated the translator, and I checked to see if the language pack was installed.

It wasn’t.

That wasn’t the only problem.

No, the entire operating system was out of date. Edgy never updates this thing. The network connection here was excruciatingly slow.

“Uh…this might take a while,” I said.

We waited for several minutes, but the progress bar had barely moved.

“Dawg, we’ll be halfway through Edgy’s funeral by the time this thing is done,” Jeff said.

“Yeah…hopefully it’ll be done by the time we reach it. I saw a mountain near that thing. We can climb up that to get close to its eye level,” I replied.

Jeff didn’t look too thrilled about this. I can’t say I blamed him. Then we headed out of the ship and towards the mountain ahead of us. A large patch of trees stood between us and it.

6- JEFF

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What a mess. I thought I was dying as we waded through the woods. The intense heat tempted me to lose my hoodie and the uncomfortably tight mask. Todd was ahead of me and shaking and jumping at the slightest noise. I almost tripped over so many thick vines as we kept walking in a straight line towards the mountain. We saw some weird bulb looking plants that shot out spores whenever we got near them. According to Todd, they wouldn’t be a problem thanks to our respirators.

I was so glad I figured out how to do this one thing with mine. While pressing a switch, I inhaled, filling my lungs with the good stuff. I exhaled and opened the side vents to release the smoke. Todd stopped and turned around.

“Is that weed in your respirator?!” Todd asked, looking both surprised and disappointed.

“Yeah man, it’s that sky dancer blend,” I told him before I inhaled more of it, held it in my lungs and blew it out. “The high is so crisp.”

Todd shook, but not out of fear. Dude was pissed.

“Can you take this seriously for once!” He roared.

“Todd, chill, you gotta relax,” I told him.

“R-r-relax!? We’re walking around on a hostile alien planet about to talk to a giant angry plant monster, and our best friend is dying, and you want me to relax!?”

“Losing your cool’s not gonna help anyone b-”

“L-losing my c-cool!? You never take things like this seriously! If you had backed me up weeks ago when I told Edgy he should’ve gone to a doctor, maybe we wouldn’t be in this mess!”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Hell, it started to piss me off. No way Todd was gonna blame me for this shit.

“Todd, Edgy is beyond stubborn. Do you think if I told him to get to the doctor he would’ve listened!?”

“Still! You took his side the entire time! Every time I suggested doing something, you just laughed it off! Even now you’re goofing off and getting high! Do you even care!?”

I don’t know what happened. One minute I was five feet away from Todd, and the next, two inches from him. I could barely keep my anger in check as Todd’s words sank in.

“You take that back! I care! I’ve been worried ever since he collapsed!”

“Well, you certainly have a funny way of showing it!” Todd replied, getting closer to me. “The entire time we were in that clinic, all you did was complain about the wait and looking for something else to do! Do you even realize Edgy can die here if we don’t do something!?”

“I do!” I shouted.

“If you two keep this shit up, not only will you be having this argument at my funeral, but my corpse will jump out of the coffin and slap the shit out of both of y’all!” Edgy growled through our communicators.

I took a deep breath. Todd and I both stepped away from each other. Arguing wasn’t gonna get us anywhere. I got where he was coming from. During the entire flight here, I was worried that we wouldn’t be able to make this drug. Edgy in a casket was the last thing I wanted, but knowing him, it might happen. It’s something you never want to think about, but it lingers in your mind. I didn’t want to consider the consequences if we fucked up.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “I am worried about this too. I’m so worried I don’t even want to think about it.”

Saying it aloud only made it feel even more real, and although I was trying to stay upbeat and distract myself from it, the fear I felt stopped me in my tracks. I couldn’t imagine life without Edgy. I don’t think Todd could either. He took another deep breath, and I saw his shoulders droop.

“I’m sorry too, I shouldn’t have s-”

“No, no, you’re right, man. We gotta do this. Edgy’s saved our sorry asses so many times, we gotta return the favor at least once.”

Hell, the whole reason the mafia were after us was my fault and Edgy wound up spending four months in intensive care. I needed to make up for that, somehow.

“R-right,” Todd whispered.

“We good?” I asked.

Todd nodded. We kept walking and the thickness of the forest changed. We were getting closer to the mountain.

“Hey Aurora, how’s Edgy?” Todd asked into his communicator.

“Not looking too good. The meds are helping, but they won’t slow it down for long. You gotta hurry,” Aurora answered.

“Alright, we’re hurrying s—”

“W-wait!” Todd said. “I think I heard something.”

I stopped and listened. Outside of some chirping from the birds, I heard nothing.

“I don’t hear anything.”

“Shush!” Todd said.

His legs were wobbling beneath him as he looked around the forest. For a second I was gonna call him paranoid, but then I heard some twigs breaking near us and I raised the sonic cannon and pointed it towards the source.

I heard a clicking noise from my left. Todd aimed the energy rifle towards it and activated the targeting laser. Nothing there.

“W-w-we’re not alone out here!” Todd whispered.

Tightening my grip on the gun, I felt it shaking in my flippers as I swept the treeline. I felt Todd press against my back as he looked around too. I heard the clicking again. This time, two clicks. Both sounded like they were directly in front of me, but I couldn’t see shit.

I heard Todd’s rifle fire, and I watched a bolt of blue energy strike one of those weird plants. It erupted with a cloud of thick spores. They clung to something. Then I saw them.

Somehow, they could cloak themselves. They walked on four legs, had no eyes, and lots of thin white tentacles covered their bodies. Beneath all of that, I saw translucent skin. I counted three of them. They were all tiger-sized.

“What the hell are they!?” I asked while backing up.

“I don’t know!” Todd said, keeping the rifle trained on them.

I could see their muscles firing as they stalked towards us. Long wing like arms sprouted from the sides that ended in sharp claws. The tendrils’ movements gave the impression of being underwater. Their footsteps were so quiet I couldn’t hear them even as I saw them approach. I felt a lump building up in my throat as the gun shook in my flippers. I couldn’t tell where these things were looking.

“Aurora, can you see through my visor? W-what are these t-things?” Todd whispered as we both backed away from them.

“Hold up, the feed’s lagging,” she replied. “Oh, what the hell are those things!? I’ve never seen that in reports!”

The three of them started making those clicking noises again, and I saw parts of their bodies light up one by one like they were deciding if we were food or not. While they had some kind of conversation, they kept getting closer and closer. Each step they took, every subtle twitch of their muscles, made my pulse soar as I expected an attack.

“M-maybe they’re herbivores?” Todd said.

Wishful thinking. The one closest to us looked up at me, and the mouth flared open, showing rings of teeth. That thing’s head and neck shot forward like a whip and it came close to biting me. The force of the strike almost made me trip.

Yeah, I don’t think they were herbivores.

I fired the sonic cannon. The one in front of me jumped out of the way of the cone of sound as it pushed everything in front of the gun back, making a low booming sound I could barely hear. I saw two more suddenly appear at our sides. They were all closing in.

Not good.

Todd started shooting. These things were fast, really fast. I watched as the bolts of blue energy from his gun hit everything but them as they sprinted around us in circles. Bits of the forest caught fire and the smell of smoke and burning wood filled my nares.

One of them came charging at me like a cheetah on crack. It leaped high into the air and its chest opened up, revealing rows of sharp teeth. I squeezed the trigger, and the large blast sent it flying like twenty feet away, making it crash and skip across the ground like a rock.

Somehow, it wasn’t dead and quickly returned for more. I had bigger problems. One of them from the sides lunged with its face and I felt its needle-like teeth scrape the mask. It hit me so hard I fell on my ass.

Todd fired the energy rifle into it and the beam made it swell up like a balloon, and then it exploded in a giant shower of indigo guts. It smelled like a bucket of rotten vegetables.

“Y-you okay?” Todd asked me.

I saw movement behind him. I yanked him towards me and then blasted the one leaping at him. That one crashed into a pool of bubbling green liquid. It started shrieking and clawing at the ground as the acid ate it alive. The thing looked like a melting wax candle as its body bubbled and dark smoke came off it. The smell almost made me sick. That’s when I noticed we were at the edge of the forest and beyond that were giant pools of boiling acid. Yeah, we were in a tight situation, screwed from all sides.

“What do we do now!?” I asked as Todd fixed his visor.

I spun around. Somehow, there were even more of them. I counted at least six, and judging from the clicking noises I heard; that wasn’t all of them. The sonic cannon in my hands felt fifty times heavier and my feet felt like they were caked in cement as I realized how screwed we were. We were dog meat.

“Uh…what now?” I asked.

“Come on, we gotta cross the acid lake!”

“What!?” I shouted.

Hearing “acid” and “lake” together didn’t sound appealing. Of course, the other option was being ripped apart by those things, so I followed him. They still chased after us. We were running out of ground but then I noticed rocks sticking out of the acid. Todd jumped to one of them. I heard them catching up. I spun around and shot one and sent it flying into two of its buddies. One of them slipped in the acid and started screaming in pain. After firing two more shots, I jumped to the rock ahead of me.

I kept the gun trained on them, but those freaky alien monster dogs stopped and snarled. Guess they weren’t too happy with their dinner escaping. I watched them backing off into the forest, and as they did, they became invisible again. Looking over my shoulder, I saw where Todd jumped to and followed him. I thought I’d have a heart attack as I put a little too much into that jump and almost slid right into the green acid.

“C-careful!” Todd shouted.

He struggled to find his footing on the small rock. Good news, we found a land strip ahead, stretching across the acid pool. Bad news was, it was a long jump, especially without getting a running start.

“Can you make it?” I asked Todd.

Todd looked at me, his eyes bulging out of his skull, and gulped. The rifle in his flippers shook, and he looked ready to have a breakdown. I don’t blame him. Todd took a deep breath and then jumped. I couldn’t watch. Less than a second later, a scream followed. I looked up to see him rolling across the black soil. He was holding onto his foot and I saw smoke coming off it and the smell of burning meat soon followed as Todd rolled and grabbed at his foot.

“Todd!” I shouted.

“It burns! It burns!” He screamed at the top of his lungs.

I checked for a different path, but the other rocks were too distant. No choice. Taking a deep breath, I made the jump to where Todd once stood. I tried to step back so I could get a running start, but there wasn’t much room. I jumped. In midair, time slowed and for a second, I thought I had made it. My feet connected with the edge of the pool. I relaxed for a moment. Then the ground gave way, and both of my heels slipped into the acid.

As soon as I did, my feet caught fire. I screamed and leaped out, falling face first into the black, rocky soil. It felt like having boiling water dunked on you, but much worse. As the searing pain coursed through my body, every nerve screamed. I felt overwhelmed. I slammed my flipper into the ground, only able to scream. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. The area smelled like burning flesh and feathers. The burns felt reignited by the air and I could barely keep my eyes open. Thought I was going to pass out. Todd, not doing any better, still had smoke coming off his foot. We lay there on the soil, screaming and fighting the pain. Eventually, it hurt a little less, but not by much.

“Fuck!” I shouted before inhaling a bunch of weed from the respirator.

“What you said!” Todd groaned, rolling over on his side.

He got to his feet, grunting as he bumped a rock with the back of his foot. I could see the irritated, raw pink flesh there. I was terrified to see mine. Taking a deep breath, I looked at them. The back of my ankles up to half of my foot was now stripped of feathers and I saw hot pink skin underneath. Dark red splotches covered everything.

“C-can you walk?” Todd asked me.

I tried to stand up, but putting any weight on my ankles made me collapse. Todd caught me and threw one of my flippers around his shoulders. I scooped up the sonic cannon with my other flipper.

“I’m sorry bro,” I said, grimacing.

“Don’t…don’t worry about it.”

Having crossed the lake, we reached the mountain’s base. Then I heard the absolute last thing I wanted to hear, those damn clicks. Thanks to the smoke from the fires, we saw them. They had gone around the lake and caught up to us. I counted eight of them approaching from the sides; my blood went cold.

“W-what do we do?” Todd asked, worry in his eyes.

Acid burns or not, we couldn’t outrun them up the mountain. There was only one thing I could do.

“Let me go Todd.”

“What!?”

“Let me down by that rock! I’ll distract them!” I told him, finding it hard to believe those words were coming out of my mouth.

They were closing in fast. I tried to spin around and aim at the one in the front, and I clipped him, knocking him down. Part way up the base of the mountain, the ground had a sharp incline. Todd struggled just to pull himself up. I was dead weight.

“I’m not leaving you here!”

“Todd, go! I’m just slowing you down!”

“No!” He shouted back.

Shoving Todd forward, getting him to drop me, I then latched onto a rock nearby and leaned against it, raising the cannon.

“What are you doing!?” Todd shouted.

“Taking this shit seriously! Get going!” I yelled while firing the cannon.

I looked over my shoulder at Todd. He lingered.

“I got this!” I said.

He shut his eyes, took a breath, and nodded to me before climbing up the mountain. I focused on the swarm of predators snarling and preparing to scale the mountain to get me. As they drew closer, I inhaled the last of my weed and set the cannon to high-power mode. I just hoped Todd could do it without me.