Re: Zero Level: Additional Adventures

[Herr D]

This Island’s YOUR Land: Chapter 4

AND TUESDAY . . .
Pete staggered back against the wall, covered with foul-smelling thick gray fluid. The wall cracked slightly. “Blech!” Pete tried to clear his eyes. He heard two footsteps as he opened them and saw a gray blur and a silvery flash. Pete shook his head. The computer screen was covered with various shades of gray goo along with the stand it was on. A large number of ripped, burst tentacles lay all over the room. Pete wiped off some more gray goo. “Dr. Helgrun? Is this some new way of . . . molting?” Pete slowly stepped out into the middle of the room, not even noticing the two gooey footprints, one misshapen, that he ruined. “Have you got any Tylenol, Dr. Helgrun?” Pete reached up and wiped off the camera mounted on the ceiling. He waved at it. “Excuse me? Could I have some Tylenol? Are we done here? . . . I’m just gonna go back and wade some more, okay? Like we agreed?” [pic]
He walked out into the hallway, and a sharkman chomped on his arm, breaking several teeth. Pete reflexively smashed it’s head in, making eye contact with the sharkman behind it. The sharkman’s head exploded, pelting Pete with dozens of teeth. Pete instinctively closed his eyes again, heard the body fall with a sickening rubbery squelch, and so missed the sound of a single sliding footstep. He heard an odd squeaking noise, and turned his head to the left to see a single sharkman ducking behind a cart and rapidly running away behind what cover it afforded. “Shark-man duck-running?” Pete shook his head. “Uh, yeah! Biting me is against the RULES, guys!” Pete thought a minute. “Wait–I just looked at that sharkman and it exploded.” He frowned. “That’s what happened to Dr. Helgrun. I looked at him, and he exploded.” [pic]
He walked to the restroom and washed up as well as he could in the sink. He heard running footsteps outside. “Hello?!” He stepped back into the hallway. On the maintenance cart was a broken pair of sunglasses, a torn pillowcase, and a brown-spotted banana. Pete frowned. They hadn’t been on the cart when the sharkman hid behind it. Faint noises were coming from around the corner. Pete heard a small thud, and an apple rolled out where he could see it. He heard odd squishy popping noises retreating. “Hello–oo?” [pic]
He walked around the corner. He saw little sucker marks on the floor leading away and letters written in sand on the floor near the wall: “PLEZ CUVR FAS! WE GO! 1 HOR!” [pic]
Pete blinked, “What’s a ‘fa,’ and why should I cover them?” He blinked again. “Ohhh.”
Tears welling up in his eyes, he trotted back to the cart and put the pillowcase over his head. “It’s not that bad,” he said to himself, “I’ll still be able to HEAR my friends without hurting them.” He waited an hour and went looking for the shortwave radio. [pic]