"YEP, THIS IS DEFINITELY HELL'S BACKYARD!" I screamed as I struggled to sprint forward, sand kicking up in my wake.
Behind me, the sky shattered.
It had been just a minute. One. Minute. Ago! The air was still calm, the sky was only a little warped.
Now?
Now it was like the heavens were splitting open.
It came like a fury unleashed.
Dark clouds tumbled over each other, ink-black and pulsing with veins of orange lightnings. They spiraled from a single point behind the dunes, growing larger with every heartbeat, until it looked like the whole sky was being devoured. The wind became a beast—it roared through the canyons and dunes, ripping sand into the air like shrapnel. Every gust hit me like a slap across the face, jarring my footing.
The rain came next. It didn't fall—it pounded, as if the sky had opened a dam and dropped a sea onto me. My suit's impact protection and the Holtzman's shield vibrates with every hit. Heavy droplets slammed into my helmet and chest, some of them felt solid like rocks, but some also felt like burning on impact.
Acidic? Corrosive?
I didn't have time to check. It felt like the storm wanted to grind me into the desert floor.
Flashes of lightning burst across the sky like exploding arteries—jagged, blinding cracks of white that split the darkness. Thunder chased them a second later, roaring so loud it made my bones tremble.
The HUD flickered and pinged, stabilizing just enough to flash:
[Distance to shelter: 1.5 km]
WARNING: TERRAIN UNSTABLE — PROCEED WITH CAUTION
"I KNOW-I KNOW!" I snapped as I skidded down a slope, nearly losing balance. Sand was turning to mud under my boots, and fissures were forming—thin, sharp cracks in the dunes, as if the storm was breaking the world open.
Chunks of earth peeled away in the distance. Massive arcs of lightning struck down like divine punishment, setting small fires in the dry vegetation far ahead. Winds spiraled into vortexes—miniature tornadoes spinning off from the core of this catastrophe.
I grit my teeth and kept running, heart thundering in rhythm with the sky. My legs screamed. My lungs burned. But somehow—somehow, I kept going.
My thoughts raced with me: Don't trip. Don't slow down. Don't look back. Don't look up. It's gaining.
"Just one shelter!" I panted, eyes locked on the compass line. "One stupid shelter! Is that too much to ask?!"
The HUD pinged again.
[1.2 km]
Structural mass detected ahead — scanning for entry point…
A spark of hope cut through the terror.
There was a chance. A tiny one.
But I'd take it.
I leaned forward and pushed harder into the storm, teeth clenched, wind howling like banshees at my back—
And the Catastrophe roared louder still.
Suddenly, a thunderclap cracked the sky—but this one wasn't like the others.
It wasn't white or purple like back on earth.
It was orange.
A blinding streak of molten light slammed down right in front of me, like a god—fuckin' Zeus hurling his lighting rod—and the ground in front of me exploded from the impact.
"—!!"
The blast hit me like a freight train.
A wave of heat and pressure knocked me clean off my feet. I felt my back hit the sand hard as my body tumbled, air blasted from my lungs, my head snapping inside the helmet with a painful jolt. My shield screamed in protest—flickering in jagged bursts of electric static like it was being short-circuited.
Chunks of something heavy and black slammed down around me, pelting the sand like hailstones of obsidian. Some of them glowed faintly at their edges—burning orange veins pulsing beneath glossy, fractured surfaces. They looked like volcanic rock, but... wrong. Alien. Corrupted. They hissed as the rain struck them, steam rising like ghosts.
I groaned. My muscles throbbed, my side ached, and my arms shook as I tried to move.
Pain bloomed across my ribs, dull but hot. Probably bruised. Maybe cracked.
My HUD? Total chaos.
Sporadic flashes blinked across my visor—maps, temperature readouts, compass pings, foreign characters I couldn't decipher, numbers and charts I didn't even register. The shield icon that surrounds me flared bright blue and red, then cut out entirely.
Then—silence.
The HUD blinked once.
And went dark.
I lay there, eyes squeezed shut, panting through clenched teeth. The rain kept pouring, and the storm howled on.
I didn't know what those rocks were. I didn't know what the hell kind of lightning glowed orange or could tear a crater into the ground like that.
But I knew this much:
I wasn't making it to the shelter in one piece if I didn't get up now.
Damn it, the ringing in my ears wouldn't stop.
I blinked.
Once. Twice.
Everything was blurred. The inside of my helmet swam in a dazed haze of blurred glass and shifting water lines. I tried to focus—but my vision was tilted, my head was pounding like a drum under pressure.
"H-Hud…?" My voice cracked.
Nothing.
"Huuud…?" My throat was dry despite the rain lashing down inside the helmet's filters. "Fuck!"
I groaned as I forced myself to sit up—every movement screaming through my side. My body ached in all the wrong places, and my head—my head felt like it had been smashed with a brick. I tasted something metallic in my mouth—maybe blood, maybe not. Hard to tell.
The wind hit me again—loud, howling, feral. Rain pelted down like thrown nails, stinging even through the armor. I could feel it trying to tear me off the ground.
"Fuck!" I growled into the storm. "HUD! Where's the shelter?! HUD?!"
No answer.
Just the howl of the storm. And the faint hiss of that black rock still steaming nearby.
I tried turning my head, scanning my surroundings in a panic. Nothing. The HUD was gone. The compass, the distance marker—everything. As if it had never existed.
"FUCK!" I screamed. My breath fogged the inside of the visor. "Damn it, damn it—!"
Then I saw them.
Far away, but getting closer—massive tornadoes. Not just one. Three—?!. Their bodies spun like drills of smoke and sand, clawing across the terrain like giants. The sky above them boiled with angry clouds and lightning, streaks of orange and blue dancing between them like some horrible lightshow from hell.
I was being trapped.
Trapped in a tightening ring of cataclysm.
"HUD!!!"
Nothing.
My pulse thundered in my ears. The earth shook beneath me as the wind grew louder. My boots were already slipping in the wet sand and mud. The temperature was dropping. The rain was colder now, like it carried frost.
I was alone. Completely alone.
And I am running out of time!
I was about to bolt in some random direction—any direction—when the inside of my visor flickered.
"Huh?!"
The HUD sputtered erratically like a dying lightbulb, static and black lines racing across my field of view. Then—
PING.
A single dot. A waypoint. A flickering marker on the edge of the map.
There was no compass anymore. No terrain scan. Just that single pulse.
But in purple?
Was it the shelter?
Was it a glitch?
I didn't know.
I didn't care.
"Fuck it. I'm going."
I ran.
I stumbled at first. Slipped on the wet mud. Nearly fell on my face. But I caught myself, gritted my teeth, and ran again.
The wind screamed past my ears, pulling at my suit, dragging at my arms. The rain was like needles now. Lightning cracked—orange again, flaring behind me with an earth-shattering BOOM that vibrated through my bones.
I didn't look back.
I dare not to look up!
I couldn't.
I ran harder. My lungs burned. My legs were starting to scream. I didn't care. I just ran toward that blinking dot like my life depended on it.
Because it did.
The terrain blurred past me, soaked and angry and sharp. Rocks jutted from the ground. Trees bent and snapped. The wind howled louder, closer, deeper.
I looked up.
A tornado. One of the three. No—four now. Closer than I thought. Bearing down like a wall of death.
"Shit—shitshitshit—!"
I screamed as I forced my legs to move faster. Just a little more. Just a little further.
The dot was still there.
Still pinging.
It's very close!
RIGHT IN FRONT OF—
WHAM!
Something hit me.
No—not something. Someone?!.
A small figure—cloaked and low to the ground—crashed into me, or I into it. The impact sent us both sprawling into the wet mud, tumbling and twisting, cloaks and limbs tangled in the chaos.
I slammed into the ground on my side with a wet squelch, the air punched from my lungs again.
I groaned.
My head—
My head.
White heat bloomed behind my eyes. My vision began to blur and I felt dizzy. My helmet's HUD flickered violently once more, trying to come back online—
—and then vanished again, leaving nothing but the hellish scenery outide the transparent visor.
"Fuck," I rasped, barely able to move.
I didn't even see what I hit. I tried to push myself up, but the world tilted sideways.
My skull was throbbing. My stomach was turning and churning.
I can't breathe.
I felt like I was going to throw up and pass out at the same time.
"Hud?" I mumbled.
Nothing.
My arms gave out. I slumped into the mud, eyelids heavy. Everything around me started to fade into a dull roar—
the storm, the cold, the pain, even the figure lying just a few feet from me.
I didn't know what I hit.
Or who.
All I knew was—
I...
I couldn't keep my eyes open much longer.
I...
Wanna go home...
+++++++++
Pain.
A sharp jolt tore through her shoulder the moment her body hit the ground.
She didn't remember falling.
One moment, she was moving through the storm. The next—she was struck.
Had she run into a tree? The shining rocks? Had the storm hurled something at her?
She didn't know.
She only knew the ache, the sting in her scalp and the dull throb pulsing through her small horns. They'd hit something—hard—and now they ached like they were split open.
She coughed once. A small, shivering breath. Her fingers twitched, clutching tightly around something—a sharp stone—its edge caked in grit and water.
She turned her head.
There—beside her—lay a figure.
Taller. dressed in white. with some long white object on the back, and a long black blade on the side. Slumped in the dirt, limbs splayed, motionless but for a shallow rise and fall of the chest.
A cracked glass ball covered the upper half of the figure's face. Transparent, fogged by rain and faint static—but still clear enough for the child to see the eyes behind it.
Half-lidded. Pained. Unfocused.
The girl blinked, wary.
Was it a man? Or... a woman?
The armor was slim, but still looked to difficult tell. And their face was half-hidden.
She crawled closer, her ribs stinging with each breath, the pain in her horns flaring with every movement. She stopped just beside the body.
Then—she heard it.
A voice. Amidst the storm
"Hu... HUD...? F-Fuck..."
The girl flinched slightly, surprised. The voice was cracked and ragged—but there was something in it. A pitch. A tone.
Familiar.
She remembered hearing voices like that—years ago, it felt like—when she skulked through shattered halls and wind-swept ruins. Voices whispering from corners, rising from cracked radios, sobbing in the dark.
Women.
So this one—she must be a woman, too.
Her voice was low, trembling. It sounded lost. Broken.
She'd heard some of those words before—back when voices still echoed through broken places where there are people like her.
Not what they meant.
Their rhythm.
She crawled forward, trembling, and stopped beside the armored figure. The blade slipped from her hand, dropping beside her with a dull thunk.
The wind roared. Rain slashed sideways. The storm above them cracked with light, orange and jagged.
She reached out with both hands and grabbed the woman's shoulder, soaked hard yet flexible material squishing between her bandaged fingers. She gave it a tiny shake.
The figure didn't respond.
Her eyes flickered.
Her breath hitched.
The girl's heart beat faster.
"No…" They muttered, a sound shaped more from instinct than speech.
She shook again, harder.
"Fuh…" she repeated, mimicking the sound she heard.
"Fuh-k."
Her own voice cracked. Throaty. Fragile.
She slapped gently at the woman's shoulder. Then her arm. Trying anything to stir her. To keep her from slipping away.
"Fuh-k... Huuh…"
The woman's eyes twitched behind the glass. They moved, slowly, disoriented.
"...Wehk," the child whispered—soft and unsure—drawing on a word someone once whispered to her long ago.
"Wehk... Wekh... Wekh… Ahp!"
She crouched close, rain dripping from her tangled purple hair and small horns, bright purple eyes wide with fear and pleading.
And still, she shook her.