5 A Small Problem.

It was silent. Impossibly silent. Maybe it was just a false alarm or somewhat, but I knew that they were coming, attracted to the crystal Jason brought with him along in his bare hands.

Wait. What.

"Y-You brought the crystal?!" I said, throwing up my arms.

"Well mate, I figured that since we already attracted those gentle insects, why not go along with it to the bitter end ey?"

"You're so dead to me."

"Mate, we already are after about a minute." He said, tying up the loose ends of the bag.

Just before I blurted the anger out of my mouth, a sizzling noise stopped me in my tracks. It was like the sound of acid dropping down to the ground beside; boiling the tiled floor in a hiss of noise.

I looked up, and I immediately regretted doing so.

"Reschedule it to a second from now... Jason." I whimpered.

The thing was enormous, crawling along the broken ceiling using it's many spiked limbs and purple, mantis-like forelegs. It's two luminescent, violet eyes fixated on us, it's beetle-like head tilting side to side then vertically in a set pattern, trying to find out which one of us would be the meatiest lump for his early lunch.

We all had just one thought. Run.

The three of us scampered to the door, pushing away tables and chairs as we made our way to the exit, only to get jumped at by the crawling mantis-beetle creature. For a big guy he sure can jump long and high.

"Bros, to the emergency exit! Fast!" We changed course, and ran opposite of the giant insect. The pest let out a loud screech, creating an excruciating noise that melted the insides of our ears.

"Don't stop!" Amir shouted. "Keep going!" We heeded his word, and slowly paced our way to the door while he stayed behind, cursing as he was entertaining a thought.

"Bloody hell! It's locked tight!" Jason said, grunting as he tried to rip open the locks with his big, muscly arms. "Got an idea!" He said. "Be back in a tad bit mate!"

He turned back and crawled his way towards the counter of the shop, rummaging through the many things under the desk.

"Jason, wha--"

He jerked out a shotgun out of the counter, and made a quite flimsy look as he examined the weapon. "So... they still allow bartenders to carry guns in New York?"

"Nice one!" I said. "Now shoot that noisy bug in the ass!" He stopped to take a quick glance at the still-shouting insect, and headed opposite to the direction of it, to the heavy door beside me.

"Jason! Shoot the goddamn insect!" I insisted. Astonishingly, the ever-high pitch of the insect stopped as Jason neared the door. The insect took a quick glance around the sorroundings, and then fixated it's fiery red eyes onto Amir.

"Amir, get the hell out of there!" I said, readying a broken glass (pepsi) by my hand.

"No Zero! It's okay. He means no harm."

"That stupid monster and it's species killed your entire family! And you're saying that it means no damn harm?!" I shouted.

"It's okay. I got this." He said.

He moved in closer to the horrifying beast, sliding in one foot at a time for what seemed like eternity towards the still insect. It was crazy.

He reached out his left arm to the insect's head, slowly closing in the gap between his exposed limb to it's jaws. He paced closer and closer, and stopped just when the tension grew close; with his palm now resting on it's crown... Befriending a human-eating alien was not on my to-do list this morning.

"Wait, he actually did--"

In a flash, he grabbed a handgun by his hip and shot the eye of the insect. As it howled in pain, Amir went in for the insides. He blew a series of holes into it's stomach through the open mouth, and spouted cursed words to the weakened insect. Every time he would start each sentence, a new wound would appear inside of it.

"You freakin' messin' with me?! Huh bro?" He grunted. "Think you're so scary that you can make me run away? Why don't you try it then."

The giant twitched it's many legs, and finally, after taking a number of Amir's curses (and bullets), it fell off it's feet, and smashed the stale floor. Hard.

After Amir made quick work of the insect, he planted a grenade by the mouth of it, then ran towards us in a fiery explosion of fire and purple bug guts. "Well..." He said. "Where were we bros?"

. . .

"T-They're coming for us." I said.

"More to kill then!" Amir said, laughing in the insect's demise. My eyes met with Jason's, and we clearly understood one thing: Amir is not the Amir we know of.

Then, by a ripple in the ground, we stumbled to the cold floor. Huge shaking was underway below, and I wasn't liking the hereafter I see.

"What in blighty was that?" Jason said.

"We've got more problems to take care of." I said. "To your right."

Jason and Amir turned to the direction I was pointing, by the broken window, and clouds of dog-sized flying scorpions by the thousands were swarming altogether towards us, about a hundred meters away.

"I guess I'm off to Bedfordshire then." Jason smirked. He turned to the door, aimed the gun to the padlocks, and with a buckshot, blasted off the locks; opening the way out.

"Now," Jason sighed. "Where to?"

The door buckled and rammed the ground at full force, creating a violent sound of a metal bashing a real solid object, echoing along the ghost town.

The dusty air of the outside greeted us in a nearly synchronized whistle, creating a shaky feeling inside my pale bones. The many still skyscrapers were still there, but something was off aside from the swarm, something big.

"Let's go!" I said. Stepping outside the restaurant.

As the words slipped past my tongue, a huge hole opened up below the foot of Jason, bringing out a barrage of razor-sharp, 5-foot fangs. Just before Jason was about to be alien brunch, his reflex kicked in and side stepped a meter away, losing only his right arm to the beast below.

He dropped to the ground and squirmed as the unknown figure rised above the surface, towering the sun with it's worm-like figure; destroying the diner in the process.

It formed a curved, horrid silhouette under the dim-lit sun of a giant worm sprouting out from the cold ground. It was big. Colossal. It's stench was overwhelming my lungs with scrithing pain, almost feeling my insides turn inside out from the acidic air it belched out. Many green-colored lumps covered the scales of the worm, almost looking like he was caught up with a bad case of smallpox.

The mere sight of it almost made me gulp down my sense of dignity and bow down to it's might.

Amir, dumbfounded, was still on the other side of the giant creature, also admiring the glory and magesty of the insect. Sure, it was scary, but that indescribable feeling of uncanny was present within me. My thoughts were like, Wow, that's quite an awesome and cool creature aside from the fact that it almost swallowed Jason's body whole!

"You bros go! I'll head this way!" He said, pointing towards the direction of the ever-nearing swarm. "Take care of Jason for me!"

"No wait--" before I realized it, the worm was staring down the struggling bodies of Jason and I with it's amber-like eye.

"Fine! I'll leave it to you!" I said. "Jason, let's go!" I quickly rushed over to Jason, whom was blacked out from the pain. His face was in unrest, and from the side, he was losing blood. Fast.

"Zero, what's the situation?" Alex called. "Jason and Amir aren't responding--"

"We may have screwed up a bit, Alex."

"Oh, you mean the giant worm part or the swarm-of-aliens part?"

"Both." I said. "Talk later, have a colossal problem here."

"Wait." She said. "Remember your promise, 'kay?"

"...Sure." I said, switching off my earpiece and trudging myself back to reality.

The worm burrowed back into the ground, sending dust storms and debris flying our way. I grabbed Jason tightly and ran for cover before any of those concrete pieces would hit us both. All the while Amir was long gone inside the diner, leaving only slime-like traces from the insect's carcass going to the swarm of flying scorpions east of us.

Man, that whole family-genocide thing with Amir's family was not taken very well by him. Like seriously. It's a mess.

In a flash, a new hole ripped out behind us and our solid cover, sending in another wave of debris our way. But this time, luck wasn't with me. A stray rock banged my head, sending me in for a world of pain.

By the time I got my senses right, I got a hella ton of force hammering down on my left leg. Broken, I told myself.

"Damn." I said, pushing away the concrete as I tried to stumble my way out. It was no use. My leg wasn't into helping me with it either. I took a wooden plank lying around the floor and made for myself a temporary splint, wrapping it to my leg with my dirty black socks.

The worm was still up high, seemingly observing us with it's fierce glance. The pupils would dilate from a cat's fierce look, to a more circular shape, then back again when I shouted and hit it's head with a pebble lying around. Not a pretty intellectual move if you asked anybody other than me.

It veered in closer, trying to intimidate me with it's bloody fangs and smoldering acid breath. And I'm sure as hell that it did a pretty damn job in doing so.

What is it after? Me? Jason? What about us both? Then why? What would it gain in eating us all? And why isn't it killing me already?

Wait. Does it want Jason only? Should I just... abandon the guy?

Bang. A bullet passed by and went in for the giant but grazed off it's hard armor easily. It was Alex.

"Uh. . need help?" Alex called over the earpiece.

"Don't shoot, it'll only anger the big guy." I said, pondering again on the question of leaving Jason.

No. I can't. Don't think these stupid thoughts Zero. You'd be better off eating Alex' cooking than sacrifice your own comrade for your own selfish reasons.

Alex, Amir, nor Jason, I ain't letting any one of them die.

I stumbled to stand on my wavering good foot, and scuttled to the next building across the asphalt road. The worm was doing nothing aside from keeping an eye on our running for our very lives. It was weird. Bizarre even. It was like, the insect was observing us, like an intelligent animal, unlike the other insects I've encountered so far.

As I took a break by the middle of the streets, the worm made it's move. It furrowed it's way underground, reckoning the entire city of New York with it's in-built tooth drill.

It made it's way towards us.

With one last gulp, I hardened myself and limped across the road, feeling my broken leg reach the capacity of a thousand volts bombarding it every tick of a second.

The worm acted like a land-dolphin (without the cute dolphin) as it made it's way towards us, digging up and back again to the ground, leaving green, acidic goo and marks on the holes it had made.

"Oh crap!" As it resurfaced and lunged towards our resting bodies, I forced myself to dash to the side in an attempt to not get eaten alive.

With it's momentum, it rammed itself into one of the buildings, lashing out a force of concrete and glass debri flying all around the area.

"Zero!" Alex called. "I need hel----------"

Boom. A loud explosion was heard throughout the city, bouncing off building walls and skyscrapers, making for itself an echo reaction. Dust storms trailed slowly towards us as a gust of wind flung me backwards, my face meeting the cold, dry asphalt.

"No." I thought. It wasn't possible. She couldn't be...

"Alex, respond! What happened?!" I shouted over the earpiece.

"Alex, don't you dare--" I was cut short by the worm's lashing out for another thrust. It's murderous intent creeping up all over my body, bringing me up with the illusion of death itself.

Crap. I can't dodge this one.

...

Dust devils swirled all around the impact as I tried to take a breathe or two in the impossibly rampant dust and dirt all around me. It was a mess. "What did I..."

I knew full well of what happened right then. Why I lived, and why I was spared.

It was just a quick thought in mind. My body moved all according to it's own accord.

No. My mind and body were in sync. That I'm aware of. They were agreeing on the same thing. Only my chest alone was feeling the immorality and shame of it.

I killed Jason.