COSMIC HORROR

A bullet flew out of Sean's pistol barrel, landing on the last target before it disappeared. Sean is relieved. Fortunately, this second try did not randomly generate a target next to Clara.

Still, Clara is still fuming that they had to try twice, not giving Sean any good faces as they left the course.

Soon, night time fell, and the cadets entered an obstacle course.

"Begin!" yelled Herbert.

Ariel crouched down into a half-body prone, lying on the left side of her body, keeping the right side of her body raised and holding on to her gun, crawling under a barbed wire net while bullets fired from Herbert's FN Minimi light machine gun whizzed past her head in regular burst fires.

"Psst," she laughed internally. "There is nothing hard about this, so basic."

Sean and the rest of the cadets then followed after Ariel, crawling.

"Hurry up!" roared Franz, standing next to Herbert. "Even my grandma is faster than you!"

Sean continued crawling, feeling something is amiss.

"Strange, those bullets do not sound like simunation rounds at all…" he thought.

Just then, a bullet whizzed past his head and smashed into a tree bark beside the course, leaving a hole. Sean immediately realized to his shock what was amiss.

"Holy sh*t it's live ammunition!" he exclaimed.

This realisation quickly sent panic into the cadets, after all, they are being fired upon with live rounds.

"Keep your heads low!" yelled Ariel, reassuring them, continuing to charge forward, fearless. Clara pushed on behind her with determination that cannot be stopped by the metal slugs of death above them.

"Scared of live ammo? I suggest you all quit!" yelled Franz. Herbert had emptied his 100 round belt and is reloading. Reza, who has been standing behind Herbert, then aimed his MP5A5 submachine gun and fired above the cadets in 3 round bursts, ensuring no break in shooting.

"ANYONE QUITTING?!" asked Franz.

"Never quitting!" roared Clara in return.

Herbert restarted shooting. "LOOK AT HOW PATHETIC YOU'ALL ARE!" yelled Franz. "Nanami! Rig it!"

Soon explosions erupted around the cadets, immersing them further into the environment of a battlefield and further adding stress onto the cadets.

The cadets cleared the barbed wire course, fortunately no one was hit by the bullets. They then started the next segment, which included jumping over barriers and crawling rope ladders. Amid explosions, the cadets toiled their way through.

"Last segment, 10 km run!" yelled Nanami. "Put on your gas masks!"

"What?!" exclaimed Albert. Running with gas masks not only blocks their vision in this already dark night which adds risks of injury, but it also greatly obstructs their breathing and wear them down faster.

"MOVE!" roared Herbert. The cadets immediately put on gas masks and ran, panting heavily, soon out of breath.

Sean gasped and gagged, remembering how much he loathed this type of training, his lungs on fire and raging, his heart beating fast and sending pain signals all over his body.

Louis tripped over a tree root next to him, almost falling had Sean not caught him in time.

Erika collapsed, panting heavily. "I can't…run…anymore…"

Eddie helped her up. "C'mon, just another 2km or more, don't stop here."

Erika grunted, standing up, and straggling forward with Eddie, following behind Louis, Sean and Albert who are now holding on to each other as they ran, all barely managing to stay running after the entire day's training, having not eaten a single bite since breakfast, not to mention running with a gas mask and adding on to their physical burden. Sean actually could have chosen to dash ahead, but he chose to stay with Louis and Albert to help them along the way.

Karl dashed forward, leading, with Clara close behind, followed by Ariel, Sean's group, Vera, Eddie and Erika, and the remaining cadets.

Upon reaching their final destination, all of the cadets collapsed, yanking off the gas masks and panting heavily, their faces all red from running at the risk of suffocating.

A few gunshots from the instructors prompted them to stand up again, falling in.

Franz glared at the cadets, then turned to Nanami. "Who ranks last today?"

Nanami looked at her score list that had been automatically sorted by the AI on her tablet, scrolling down. As she did so, she is apprehensive internally, not wanting to see her sibling's name appearing at the last column.

Her hung-up heart is put down upon seeing Sean's name at the 73rd position, barely above the 74th and 75th positions, as his physical performance managed to cover up his barely passing shooting score.

"Number 34!" she reported.

Number 34 staggered out, from both fatigue and the emotional damage of being eliminated despite already trying her best and holding on.

Nanami directed her to the flag pole, which number 34 put down her number tags and helmets at. Finally, the willpower that has been holding her on is gone, and she collapsed, fainting. Medics on standby around the course immediately carried her away on stretchers.

"That concludes things for today," said Franz without an ounce of emotion.

The cadets dragged themselves to the shower rooms. Upon collecting their fresh set of uniforms for tomorrow's training, they headed back to their dormitories and collapsed onto their bunks, too tired to do anything else.

"Lobster roll…" muttered Louis, starving, his brain already stopped functioning from the fatigue and hunger.

"Say…" muttered Albert. "Are these…jerks…going to screw…us again?"

Sean groggily turned to him. "Even if they want…we can't do a thing about it…just sleep…and…cope…"

"Good…night…" muttered Eddie.

The 4 fell asleep, snoring loudly and too tired to see a nozzle being slipped into a gap in the door which had been opened by the instructors, pumping in a gas.

"You sure about this?" asked Bryan worriedly.

"Relax, we have checked with the doctors," said Nanami. "None of the cadets have adverse reactions to this kind of anaesthetic, and we are doing it in moderation."

Bryan turned to the medic team who is on standby beside. They gave him a thumbs up.

After some time, Sean opened his eyes, finding himself in a black space.

A piano is being played in one corner, Sean recognised the piece played to be Dmitri Shostakovich's Suite for Jazz Orchestra No.2, a piece that he had once loved listening to before he retired, but strangely, it's played in a way that is extremely chilling and creepy, not to mention the instruments of the entire orchestra being played when there is only one piano in this space.

Perplexed, he approached the figure in a white cloak playing the piano, roughly making out its silhouette to be that of a human, or an Angel.

The figure seemed to notice his presence and removed its hands from the keyboard, though to Sean's horror the piano still played on as the keys moved on their own, as if there is an invisible hand playing.

The figure looked at him, staying still, suddenly, a familiar voice started to resonate around him like a cinema sound system, scaring the living daylights out of Sean.

"It's good to see you, Sean…" the voice said, the figure removed her cloak and Sean saw an Angel female, ghostly as per their subspecies.

No, her entire face was devoid of blood, pale as a sheet, ghostly, even for an Angel. Sean darted to her head, seeing the exit wound of a full powered rifle cartridge, the wound's blood had dried up.

Sean collapsed, gasping in horror and guilt as the figure continued to advance to him, repeating those last words of hers like a broken record.

"Freyja…" Sean muttered… "I am…sorry…" he gasped, tears of regret raining down his cheeks.

Freyja's spectre ignored his words, keep on repeating her last words as she backed Sean into a corner. Sean profusely apologised, but to no avail as soon Freyja's spectre transformed into her "true form", a being beyond human comprehension that makes the scariest of cosmic horrors written under the pen of H.P Lovecraft look like animals from a children's petting zoo in comparison. It is a grotesque amalgamation of parts, as if someone had taken random body parts of different animals and fused them into an artwork designed to be perversion to nature.

Strange runes then mixed together with Freyja's comforting yet creepy voice, forming a demonic chant of sorts, the same alien language that gave Sean's species the collective name of "Sellardraxians", which no one on Earth understands.

"Good to see you…"

"Stop…" Sean muttered, "I am sorry..." he begged for forgiveness.

For a brief moment Sean thought he saw a Deep Dweller behind Freyja's true form, eyeing him like a child observing his crayon drawing with satisfaction as if it is a perfect art piece. The Deep Dweller was then gone in a flash of purple neon light, resembling those found in Cyberpunk aesthetics.

"Good to see you…"

"Stop!"

"Good to see you…"

"STOP!!" Sean roared, violently awaking, breaking out in cold sweat. He panted, calming himself down. He blinked, observing his surroundings, finding to his surprise that they are in a space elevator, all of the remaining male cadets are here in a sleeper cabin as it rose to the Moon.

"Number 9, you, ok?" asked a concerned instructor. "Don't tell me the space sickness has already gotten to you."

Sean then saw Phineas waving at him with an amused expression, monitoring the cadets fastened into the sleeping pods with the rest of the medical team.

"What, did the anesthetics got you high and you saw cosmic horrors?" he laughed.

Sean forced a laugh, trying his best to appear normal.