N.E.R.D.s against the universe
    “What do you mean you lost it?” “Hey TJ,I was sitting at the table and it must’ve slipped out of my hand while I was eating.”Remember the drive we found in the Himalayas?Yeah,Brenden lost it. “Accio hard drive!” “TJ I tried that.It doesn’t work.Why do you need it so badly?” “That hard-drive had an encryption on it,supposedly showing us where Ultrus’ siblings were,and we lost it!”I got so angry I kicked the table we were sitting at across the room,breaking in half on the pillar next to the back door.”You know,we already tracked one of them down.”I looked over my shoulder and saw Osaze coming through the airlock.We were in a space ship floating over the rings of Saturn,heading for a space station seven-hundred-fifty-four miles away.I calmed down and spoke,”We’ll be there in about an hour,let’s go check on the trainees.Maybe we can do a quick game of capture the flag.”
  “Line up!”Ivan’s voice rang around the training room and four of the younger super powered people we each took under our wing.He whispered to me as we passed by, “All yours man.” “Thanks,I’ve got something fun planned.Ok trainees,we know you’ve been itching for a fight.So,let’s do a good ‘ol match of CTF,no guns,explosives,super speed,or invisibility,only knives and powers like flight,elemental control,and animal morphing.Start picking teams and strategies.”I saw Ellis,blonde hair,Grant,ginger hair,James,brown hair,and Amanda,black hair, start choosing who would be with who.James was mine,Ellis was being taught by Ivan,Amanda saw to by Brenden,finally Grant was standing by Osaze.Grant and Amanda chose to be on a team with me and Osaze,while Ellis and James chose Brenden and Ivan. “Everyone ready?”The rest of them nodded in unison. “Good.Ok,set the stage Dr.Jarom!”He held a thumbs up,but looked depressed inside the control room on the second floor.I was guessing that it was because of what he told me about two weeks ago.Little did I know,it was something even more terrifying.
  The arena was a rectangular box,a little longer than a ¼ mile,with traps set by either side and platforms on the walls and floating around in various sizes with rocks,water barrels,and fire pits for the elemental powers.“Go!” I yelled at the top of my lungs to both teams.”Grant,boost me up!”To my left I saw Grant push his hands forwards,feeling wind gather around him,boosting me up to the top platform floating four-hundred feet away from their base below.I got lucky with a water barrel right next to me.I surged forward,jumping off the platform,breaking the water barrel and making a wave to ride on.A ballista turret sprang from the wall to my right and shot giant bolts at me.I caught them with the wave sending them at the other base and saw Ellis and James on my side while Brenden and Ivan were on the left side,shooting flames and tiny rock pellets at Osaze and Amanda.I turned back just in time to see a giant boulder next to my face and forced it away with wind,turning into a hawk flying to the top of the arena.With the enhanced vision I could see a flag sitting on one of the platforms below and flew directly to it and changed back,grabbed it and floated away onto the first platform I was on.The moment I got there,Ellis and James started swing with their hunting knives.”Really James?You just had to choose that side didn’t you.” “Well,you aren’t exactly my best teacher.”With a smug little look on his face. “Sarcasm.At Least you learned one thing from me.Time to learn another.”I summoned a knife the size of a sword and started slashing with such speed they could barely dodge the knife blade by a mere second. “That’s not fair.You said “knives” not swords.” “It is a knife.Just a really big one.”I swung one more time and both James and Ellis were on the floor,wheezing from exhaustion. “The lesson was you don’t have to play by the rules.You can bend them to make a sort of fair fight,or break the rule and tip the scales in your favor.Remember that in a fight.”I jumped down with the heavy red flag,just about get to the flag post at our base.Then,I heard it.The alarms going off.I see a crack between my feet.
   “Dr. Jarom,what’s going on!” “I don’t know!The cracks just appeared all across the ship.Quick, get to the hangar!” “C’mon we have to hurry!”We all bursted from the room just before it exploded.We ran across the corridors,using superspeed to get the crew to the escape pods nearby.The hangar was almost broken in half. “Get in!” I looked in front of us and saw Dr. Jarom piloting the jet-like space craft.It was a tight fit,but we needed to get out of there.It boosted out of the hangar and blew the blast doors open leaving some of the pilots in space floating around.But,I looked behind the ship and saw a shadow that looked like an octopus and tiger mixed,but twice as big as the ship.The roar was even more terrifying,a deep rumble sounding like a giant burp,even its roar could make sound travel through space. “Dr. ,what was that thing that attacked the ship behind us?” “I do believe that we have already found one of Ultrus’ siblings.”
“What?” “That was one of Ultrus’ siblings.I picked something up on the sensors in the control room while you guys were running around,but I didn’t know it was a giant octopus monster that is twice as big as the ship.It disappeared,anyways,why should we worry about it?”I kept thinking about it appearing in front of the glass. “Hey TJ,guess we won.” said Osaze sounding very exhausted.I hadn’t realized I was still holding the red flag. “Where did you learn to pilot a space jet Dr.Jarom?” “I took a couple classes in the old days as a normal pilot with my brother in law.Picked some stuff up I guess.”Then I saw the giant metal behemoth.The space station looked like an upside-down sewing needle with a ring of platforms near the rounded top. I heard a voice come on the radio sounding very terrified. “Are you guys all right?We picked something up on the radar,but something was jamming the signal to your ship.Are you the only survivors?” “No,there are others in escape pods just behind us.Pick them up on the way to check the wreckage,and yes we are fine.” I heard Dr. Jarom say,still having that same disturbed look on his face when I saw him in the control room.Some person came out of one of the various airlocks around the station,and guided us towards the hangar.We jumped out of the ship and the first thing we saw was the trainees staring at everything and looking at all the complicated machines.A man with different colored eyes,one blue and one green came up to us gasping for air,as if he had done a full lap around the station before getting here. “General Storke wants you to meet him...at the training room...to test how good you really are.” He fell over and looked like he was about to pass out,so me and Brenden helped him up from the floor and gave him to one of the medical officers nearby,and we headed off. “Why can’t we just get a break for once from all the fights and training?” I heard James say from behind me. “Trust me James,it’s putting a strain on all of us.But,who knows?Maybe this won’t time the floor won’t break in half.”I said without turning around,being aware of my surroundings in case a monster turns up again. James made a comment saying, “Does Storke not know how we,” gesturing to the other three trainees, “are currently being trained by you four,who took down a secret government project capable of destroying the world?” We all walked through the door laughing until, we saw what General Storke looked like.All of us at the same time repeated one word. “Oh.”
  He was massive.Imagine Arnold Schwarzenegger,but much bigger and was lifting truck to show off and the first thought I had,that I had also decided to share with the group,was “How big of a uniform does this guy wear?His bed must be the size of a house.” He spoke with a very deep and loud voice “So,you all ready for a challenge or are you just going to stand there?” “We’re ready to fight any day.” “Good.Confidence,I like that.” I looked behind me for a split second and saw the fear in everyone’s eyes.I was even more terrified of what we would have to fight.Him or something even stronger? “You won’t be fighting me,but a genetically modified demon of our own that we created to combat you.”I closed my eyes afraid of what this behemoth could’ve created.The answer came in form of a beagle puppy.I was about to say what when it turned and looked at us with curiosity.I knew immediately something was wrong because it’s eyes had a red tint to them and no pupils.Then,it started changing into this weirdly shaped monster with a dragon-like body,three heads,all in the shape of a beagle,and giant teeth with purple stuff oozing out of it’s curved teeth.It attacked spraying the acidic goo everywhere,and when it hit something it exploded a couple seconds later. “Run!” I yelled at everyone,hoping they would obey.We all scattered across the room until I saw Dr. Jarom got pinned by spikes on it’s back.This “thing” was like several animals at once a dragon,dog,komodo dragon,and pufferfish.(Yes,I know the last one doesn’t make a lot of sense,but just keep reading.)I summoned a sword and cut off the spikes impaling the Dr. to the wall.I hadn’t noticed everyone was attacking it with their powers and guns.I didn’t have any clue what to do until Ivan threw a piece of metal at one of the mouths and inside the mouth,for a split second,I saw a metal hinge. “Everyone,metal-bend it!” They all yelled back, “What?” The Dr. must’ve saw the hinge too,because he just screamed at them, “Trust him,or we’ll all die!” So,everyone but me took a part of it’s body,bending and twisting it,revealing a metal shell underneath.It had actually worked.I had a plan that if I wasn’t right,we’d fail the challenge.I jumped to the ceiling,right above it’s center mouth, and flew as fast as I could,controlling the purple slime to make a shield around me as my body plunged inside of the monster’s belly.Then, I finally threw all the purple explosive goo inside of the monster’s belly.Hearing General Storke laughing as loud as he could,I leaped out and heard an explosion.I looked behind me to see a destroyed monster with metal shards everywhere. “That good enough for you,or do you want to fight us yourself?” “No,no.That metal monster was designed to be stronger than even me!” “Do you still need it to do stuff?” I asked him,just in case another huge monster disguised as a beagle attacked us. “Yes,we need it to protect the pods outside among various other things.” “Okay then,”I felt a wooden thin rod appear in my hand.”Reparo.” We all saw the pieces flying off the ground and join together.All the cracks,jagged edges and burn marks fixed themselves. “Send it to go find the other people in the pods.”James started up again, “But,we need to find that alien thing and kill it.” Storke’s voice boomed inside the room rumbling it, “We’ll worry about that later.For now,go and get some rest from that challenge I just put you through.”He smirked after that last comment.James started towards Storke,I grabbed his shoulder before he got within punching range.I shook my head “No,we’ll have to figure out what’s going on here and why he sent us through that later.” “General,send your men to go find a hard-drive among the wreckage after you get everyone on board the station. “I’ll have them do it immediately.”James stormed off ahead of the group before anyone could do anything.
“Search every crack and crevice for that drive!” I heard Storke say over the intercom. “We can’t just sit here and do nothing!” James yelled at the top of his lungs.Ironic since we actually were just sitting in the room the general showed us to.Twelve bunks and six rows on either side,3 bathrooms,and mini snack dispensers put into the walls by each row to shoot out our favorite snacks and drinks.I was sitting on the third row,top bunk laying down,a light blue light shining in my eyes making me squint to be able to see.I turned over,my legs dangling off the edge of the bunk, and said to James, “I know you’re plan.Go find the monster and kill it.But,we don’t know where the hard-drive is,where the monster is,if it’s peaceful,-” I got interrupted by Osaze grabbing a pack of peanut butter M and M’s,about thirteen sitting in his hand. “Hand me some of those.” I asked feeling a rumbling in my stomach.I stuffed the five I got in my mouth,the peanut butter and chocolate overwhelming my taste buds. “Or if it has any powers of it’s own.” “Well,what do you guys think we should do?Ellis?”I looked over to him lying up against the wall of his bottom bunk,turning over so we could see only half of his face.He waved his hand saying, “Hey,keep me out of this.” “Grant,Amanda?” “They both said at roughly the same time, “I don’t really care.” “Fine.Since you’re the leader what do you think we should do?” Gesturing a finger at me. “I think our best option is to stay put for now,because I’m not really in the mood for a suicide mission,” At that moment,a medical officer came in,shouting at us, “C’mon.Quickly!” I jumped out of the bunk,already breaking into a run,saying to everyone, “Let’s go.” I didn’t have to look behind me as we all rushed through the complicated hallways,hearing a giant thud against the metal floor as each step rumbled the ground.I recognized the pathway from the first time we were walking along those corridors.We were going to the hangar.My eyes widened when I first saw them.All the pilots and soldiers on the escape pods had a sickness or something wrong with them.They were crawling out of the pods,with greyish,pale skin,were weak,vomiting and coughing.The commander of the soldiers,whom I had met just before we got on the ship to never see him again until now,had a dark brown moustache with white hairs among the others,blue eyes,muscles weren’t very noticable due to the fact he was about 60 years old,and streaks of gray going through his brown hair.I noticed no one else had spoken,each of them having a look of terror on their faces, “What happened?”The commander coughed before he spoke and a weird green dust came out, “I don’t know.We were all fine in the pods on the way to the station,until,the pilots started vomiting and coughing.Not too long after,we were all sick and I could barely move,I think I was unconscious for a couple of minutes maybe an hour.When I woke up,we were in the hangar and someone was running for help.” He winced and the second he stopped talking,I saw a neon green line go through a vein in his arm,up to the top of his shoulder,and disappear.Shocked,I quickly said, “Go and get some rest.Maybe you’ll get better soon.”As the medical officers put him on a nearby stretcher,he weakly responded with, “Hopefully.” They carried him away as he closed his eyes and I hoped for the best.
We were all sitting in the room later that day,none of us were speaking until I decided to bring up the questions that I couldn’t stop thinking about. “Am I the only one who noticed that green worm in his arm?”Ellis was the first one to answer, “I thought it was just my imagination.You guys saw it too?” Everyone nodded.I continued, “ What do you guys think it is?An infection?” Dr.Jarom said, “If so,we need to find Dr. Starr because she has medical training.”Brenden replied with, “Really?” “Well,she’s not called “doctor” just for show.” Brenden asked another question. “What about O’brien?” “He’s helping with the electricians.He could be anywhere by now.”I got annoyed and got us back on track. “We need to find out what that green worm is now before it infects the entire station.”We all ran across the station looking for her until I heard a voice in my head.Amanda’s voice. “Guys,I found her!TJ, you need to see this.”  We all got grouped together and were standing right in front of the science lab.The room was all of one color.Green.
  When we walked in we were greeted by Amanda and Dr. Starr,both wearing gas masks,standing around a pile of glowing green worms,about a foot tall,in a broken glass case.Realizing what the gas masks were for,I enveloped the worms in a wind cocoon.They both pull of the gas masks showing the faces underneath.Dr.Starr was gasping for air and said, “Thanks TJ.Now,you guys need to know what those are.”gesturing towards the pile. “They don’t have a name,but they are a parasite,feeding off of a certain thing found in your blood stream.”Confused and feeling a slight throbbing in the back of my head,
I said “Wait,so it can only affect us or other people as well?”referencing to the infected pilots and soldiers. “It can infect other people making them weak and sick,but to you guys it is very lethal.”I,still trying to find out what they do said, “Why?”Dr. Starr clasped her hands together,closed her eyes,looked back at me and the rest of the group,and sighed. “Because of the serum in your blood,brain,every part of your body,the worm reacts to it,eventually killing you if it gets to your brain.The worm reacts to the serum,making a very potent acidic compound that can melt your entire body and weakens your powers from the serum itself.”The throbbing got stronger and I saw Amanda,Osaze,Ivan,and everyone was rubbing the back of their head or their stomach.It made a sound like a cannon in my ears my heart was racing so fast.Soon,all of us were on the ground in pain,and I couldn’t control the wind cocoon holding the worms back.Over half of them slithered around the floor and went outside.The other ten left slowly inched closer to each of us and I could feel heat and some sort of acid coming from it,melting the floor and making tiny craters everywhere.The one that was closest to me got poised like a snake and from that angle I saw a mouth with several teeth inside in a ring pattern.For a moment it seemed like it wasn’t going to do anything until,it striked.Going straight for the palm of my hand,it burrowed under the muscles and veins slithering up my arm.Slowly feeling my powers fade away,and me die slowly inside from a burning acid inside of my body,I had one last thought and shared it to everyone. “Why is everything we do,especially this,all crazy and out of order like the pages of a book glued into different places?”I was starting to black out and almost dead as I saw people in black body armor,each holding a rifle in hand.I heard very faintly, “They’re weak.Sir,what do you want us to do?” I saw a giant man wearing a pair of army camo pants,big enough to hold a truck in his hands.General Storke. “Take the shot.Leave no witnesses.”At the last moment I heard a gunshot and thought of one shocking thing.“What if all of this isn’t real?”But,it wasn’t the finale of my life.Not yet.