Chapter 60: Shaquine Spawn

Intense pain gripped Lusac as he stood in the kitchen, waiting for his [Power Burger] to finish. It was as if all the fever in his body coalesced into a few points, a large one on his shoulder and small ones at each wound on his hand.

Lus cried out as he fell to his knees, his head starting to swim. He heaved ragged breaths as he felt his skin bulge and twist in odd ways.

"What's… happening?" he questioned between gritted teeth in the empty room.

All at once the pain reached its peak, hot jolts shooting through his body, and then came a tearing feeling along his skin at his old shoulder wound as well as the gashes in his hands.

Something was coming out of his body, something that was very much alive.

The worming sensation ended, and Lus groaned as he collapsed all the way to the ground. Tears stung his eyes, but at least it was over.

A cold chill crossed his body as his [Sixth Sense] activated in response to five different beings in the room.

"Shaquine," he murmured as the realization set in. "I carried them onboard inside myself. I'm the root cause of this."

Glimpses of something flashed in the corner of his eyes as the aliens started their work of trying to drive him insane. Lus mustered enough [Strength] to sit back up and feel along his shoulder where two of the Shaquine had spawned, but he found the skin closed. How that worked, he didn't know, but he was grateful that at least he wasn't bleeding out.

"I have to fix this. I'm the one who did this. It must be that infection, but how do I stop it?" he said to himself, ignoring the sounds of footsteps coming from behind.

The timer on the microwave heater beeped, reminding him that he wasn't out of tricks yet. Forcing himself to his feet, Lus went to the freshly heated [Power Burger] and pulled it out of the microwave heater. He gave it a few seconds to cool while grabbing the spare condiments he had from last time. He then put it together and took a very large bite.

It wasn't nearly as good as it had been fresh, but he was pleasantly surprised with how well it kept its flavor after being frozen and then reheated. The texture was all wrong, but he could ignore the mushiness in favor of reminding himself what he would get once he finished.

The Shaquine attacks lessened as four of them found escape routes from the kitchen.

"Go join your friends in terrorizing the others. I'm basically immune," Lus declared to the creature around his last mouthful of burger.

As he swallowed, the notifications popped up.

[+10 Strength]

[+5 Stamina]

With them, Lus could feel the change in his body, the exhaustion gone and his body eager for the next challenge.

"Just get the artifact and clear the ship. And find the doctor and get her help with the whole spawning invisible aliens thing," Lus said. He would only have a few hours with this extra boost to his stats, but that would be more than enough time to fix everything.

After adjusting his bandages to ensure they remained over the wounds in his hands, Lusac went to the door and listened for sounds of the others outside of it. He couldn't hear anything out in the hallway, so he was willing to bet that those four had gone off to find other victims.

His stomach clenched in remembrance of the blood. They hadn't killed anyone, right? Surely the killing hadn't started yet, or perhaps their victim had gotten away. Kremel were quite tough.

"Save the ship first. That's how you keep anyone else from getting hurt," Lusac reminded himself. Once he had the artifact, he could scare off the Shaquine from Nippy and Cewi-Bano and Captain Tave and then they could figure out what to do from that. He just had to get some of the crew back to normal.

Taking one last breath, Lusac disengaged the emergency lock and opened the door to the corridor. It was empty from what he could see, but there were black and green streaks of blood along the walls.

"Those were probably there before, and I just didn't notice them," he reassured himself, finding the words hollow. He shook his head. No need to worry about this now. He needed to get to the upper deck and track down the artifact.

Lus jogged through the corridors, his eyes constantly moving in case someone tried to surprise attack him. He came to the ladders and eagerly started upwards, grateful for the boost to his stats from his snack.

He reached the second deck where the Captain's quarters were and exited the ladder system. He was torn between checking Tave's quarters and his office first, but he figured it was slightly more efficient to start with the one he was closer to so he didn't have to traverse the ladders quite so much.

This deck was eerily quiet and lonely, and half of the emergency lights were out which made it hard to see any details clearly. Lus had never been to the Captain's quarters; he only knew where they were from memorizing the ship's map. Nobody could be mad at him for invading personal space when the fate of the entire ship was on the line.

As he walked through the hallway, he had an uncomfortable question cross his mind.

When will the next batch of Shaquine pop out of me?

It was unpleasant to think of going through that again, especially when he considered the ramifications of unleashing another five of the Shaquine onto the crew. Who knew how many were already out? He assumed there were at least fifteen by now, but he had no way of knowing for sure.

He was getting close to the Captain's quarters when a hand grabbed his shoulder. Lus jumped back and spun around with his fists up to defend against the attacker.

"Oh, Quniwel. It's you." He tried to sound relieved but in truth this was like a repeat of his worst nightmare.

The Nemarian stared at him with his one good eye, unblinking and a gun leveled at his chest.

"Quniwel. You remember what happened on Aschir Alpha, right? Somehow those creatures got onboard, but you understand how they work so you can fend them off," Lusac assured him as he slowly backed away, hands in the air. If he could reach the quarters, he could use the emergency lock to protect himself from the Nemarian who was surely insane once more.

"Lusac," Yonnex-Quniwel said in a shallow voice.

"Yeah. It's me. We're friends," he replied with a smile. He was careful in his movements, worried that if he did anything sudden, the Nemarian would shoot.

"Killer." Quniwel's eye remained trained on him.

"No. I wasn't trying to kill you, Quniwel. I was protecting Wsr, and you even. You have to believe me," Lusac pleaded. His [Sixth Sense] warned him of several Shaquine in the area.

"Killer," Yonnex-Quniwel insisted.

"Come on, Quniwel. The real you is in there. Fight it," Lus encouraged him. A shiver passed over his body as one of the Shaquine went by.

A tear formed in Quniwel's eye, and his hand tightened on the trigger. "Kill the killer."

"I didn't mean for any of this to happen, Quniwel. I'm sorry." Lusac stopped moving, recognizing that he was never going to make it in time.

The only good news was that if he died, his body might stop producing Shaquine, not that that would be helpful anymore. He could only hope someone else had enough possession of themselves to figure a way out of this mess.

Lus closed his eyes as he waited for the blaster bolt. Maybe he did deserve this after what he'd done to Quniwel.

A shot sounded, and Lusac's eyes popped open in an instant when nothing blasted into his chest. A strangled gasp escaped his throat as he watched Yonnex-Quniwel with the few remnants of his head fall to the ground.

"He was referring to himself this time," Lus said quietly, his eyes fixated on the remains.

Footsteps came from behind, but he was well trained in ignoring such things, something he regretted when a body bulldozed into him.

"You killed Quniwel!" Yrqw gestured to the body.

Lusac pushed himself off the floor. "No. That's not what happened."

"Murderers deserve death," the Kremel replied. Black blood streamed from a cut on his head. Yrqw was clearly as under the effects of the Shaquine as anyone else.

"Yrqw, listen to me." Lus held his hands up. "It's an alien. It's driving you crazy, but none of it is real. Wake up."

Yrqw cried out and raised his fists up. Lusac darted out of the way and then dashed to the door of the Captain's quarters. He got inside and hit the lockdown button, slamming the door closed before Yrqw could reach him. The Kremel screamed and pounded on the door, but Lus was safe… for now.

Breathing hard as tears formed in his eyes, Lus set his head against the door, listening to each thud. This was all his fault. Quniwel was actually dead, no doubt about it, because of him. Trying to control his shaky breathing, Lusac turned back around to examine the room he now stood in.

"Blast it," he muttered as he noted the mess. Broken pieces of pottery littered the ground alongside ripped up paintings. Someone else got here first it would seem. Here was hoping they hadn't taken what he needed yet.

Lusac carefully stepped through the disaster, watching his feet to ensure he didn't break anything important–at least more than it already was. Hopefully the artifact piece was still intact. Surely they were more durable than these former vases. They had been around for thousands of years already after all.

Lus sighed in relief as he caught sight of a familiar looking piece of "pottery." It was one of the artifact pieces, though now that they'd gathered quite a few, he wasn't sure which one this was.

"I guess I'll have to collect them all," he said as he scooped up the first. The next few minutes constituted a treasure hunt as he wandered the room, picking up all the other artifacts from their recent missions.

Once he had them all in hand, he glanced around the room. He couldn't very well carry an armful of artifacts around the ship like this. He needed a bag.

His eyes settled on the closest door and lightly stepped over to it. He pressed a button and the door opened revealing an array of nearly hung uniforms. Didn't the Captain keep a backpack or something around? Or was he too high of rank for something as mundane as carrying things?

Lus shifted his load to be held against his body with only one arm while his free hand reached into the closet to dig around some. He'd just barely touched the first uniform when a new hand shot out and grabbed his arm.

Yelping, Lus jumped back and dropped the pile of artifacts. The hand and the person attached to it came along, and he found himself staring into the bloodstained, ragged face of Captain Tave.

"Captain. Sorry. I didn't realize you were in here," Lus stammered.

The Captain bared his teeth with a growl.

"Look, Captain. We're dealing with the Shaquine, I'm sure of it. One of these artifacts–maybe all of them even–will protect us from their effects." He gestured to the pile of objects he'd left behind.

As he spoke, his [Sixth Sense] triggered, alerting him to two Shaquine in the room.

"Look. There are even two in here with us now. You probably feel chills or see flashes of light or hear weird noises, but that's just the Shaquine. It's a lot easier to fend off their attacks once you know what they are," Lusac explained, a hint of a smile on his face in hopes of easing the angry face before him.

Lus noted a flash of light in his peripheral, and Captain Tave turned to look as well, sensing the same thing.

"See. That's them," he said.

In the next instant, Captain Tave screeched and launched himself into Lusac, tackling both of them to the floor.