“What the hell are you doing?” I asked as another round of explosions went off around us, my small companion seemed to be struggling with something in the wall.
“My arms stuck!” growled my Human partner.
Moving over to him I looked at the mess. I had avoided the collapsing wall but he had taken the brunt of the collapse, what was left of his arm was stuck in the wall beneath several hundred kilos of rubble.
Vainly I tried to move one of the beams off of the rubble to release him but I could barely get the thing to budge, I was stronger than him if I could not move it he most certainly not going to escape.
“We’re falling behind on the mission time,” growled the Human.
I moved an eye back to him, despite the injury he was staring at his time piece identical to the one I and the members of every other team was wearing.
“I will continue without you, come back and rescue you when the objective is complete,” I said.
The Human shook his head, “Fuck that, we don’t have the time to split up.”
Reaching into his belt with his free arm the Human pulled out a small needle, after plunging the drug into his arm he put his pistol to his arm and pulled the trigger several times. The sound reverberated in the small corridor and I winced.
He was shooting himself!
“What are you doing!” I asked distressed. Putting out a claw I snatched the gun away from him.
The Human ignored me and reaching into his belt pulled out his knife brought it down on his own arm. A wet squelch of tearing flesh and crunch of breaking bones and a moment later the Human stepped away from the wall.
“Continuing the mission,” said the Human.
I was flabbergasted, even injured he took several steps from the wall and towards our objective. I couldn’t help but stare at what was left of his appendage as it slowly dripped red blood, the same color as my own onto the ground.
The Human had cut off his own limb! He had to be insane!
“Let’s go!” growled the Human, leaving his main weapon clipped to his chest and putting his hand out to me, stunned and not really thinking if it was wise I returned his small weapon to him.
“Why did you do that!?” I asked.
The Human glanced back at me, a look I interpreted as confusion in his eyes, “We have to complete the mission, even injured I can fight.”
“You’re no injured! You’re insane! You just cut off your own limb!” I hissed at him, for a moment letting my tongue creep impolitely out of my mouth as I tried to convey my distress.
He glanced down at what was left of his arm, “I gave myself a coagulant and a pain killer. I can barely feel it. I’m fine. It’s not like the arm was going to work very well after being crushed like that anyway,” He said as he raised his shoulders in some unconscious gesture.
I was unable to ask anything else as a group of several more infected streamed out of a hallway in front of us.
Raising my weapon I cleanly dispatched several of the grotesque malformed aliens. They vaguely resembled my Human companion but were smaller and more vicious, with teeth that could cut through even the thickest armors.
The Human beside me was able to kill just as many as me, hitting them with clean shots to the head using a weapon that was not designed for accurate one handed operation.
“How are you so calm about this?” I asked as we continued down the hall.
“About the things? They’re not Human anymore,” he said as he stepped over the corpse of one of the creatures kicking its small body aside.
“Not that! Losing your arm!” I said.
“Why are you obsessing over this? We have to keep moving!” said the Human.
“You injured yourself, willingly!” I said.
The Human looked confused for a moment, he motioned with his remaining hand at the other side of the doorway. Taking the cue I quickly went to it and held up my claw, and then slowly counted down as he moved to the other side of the door.
At zero I moved and punched the door down ripping it free from the hinges. My Human companion rushed inside his arm still raised gun at the ready.
The room was empty and slowly the two of us continued.
“It’s not like I wanted too. We have a mission to complete, if we don’t then billions die. I’m betting we’re the last team in the compound considering the size of the explosion.”
I had not considered that, we were one of the more forward teams and the explosion that had caused the collapse and taken his arm had come from behind us.
“Then we should hurry, the extraction will be here in,” I glanced at the mission clock on my wrist, “ten minutes.”
My Human companion nodded and we continued to work our way through the facility dispatching the enemies as they appeared in front of us. At one point my gun jammed up and I was forced to finish of several of the creatures simply by ramming them with my much more substantial bulk.
The Human unhooked his main weapon and tossed it to me. The Human machine was a little small in my claws but it would work, he was still using the side arm.
“Next room should be the objective,” I said.
The Human nodded and repeating the process we had with the other door we entered the power plant for the facility.
The place had originally been a Human facility but with all the modifications the infection had made I wasn’t sure what was Human and what was infection.
“Damn, they made a mess of this,” said the Human.
Limping over to the console he typed something in with his single hand.
“Fucking hell.”
The tension in his body seemed to die, his entire frame usually held up tall and powerful even with the injury slumped.
“What?” I asked.
“All safeties have been disengaged, the overload will take place in under ten seconds when I set it in motion. We won’t make it to the extraction point,” said the Human as he turned around to look at me.
I looked at him confused, “You’re not planning to set it off then, are you!?” I asked.
He seemed equally as confused, “Of course I am, we don’t destroy this facility and the infection spreads to both our home worlds!”
“But we’ll die!” I said.
“Then we die heroes! And we save the billions on our planets, how is this even a debate?” he asked, as if even considering killing himself was rational.
“Because I’m not going to kill myself!” I said.
The Human looked at me for a moment, “You’re insane!” he said.
The Human was the insane one, wanting to kill himself! Their whole species had to be self-destructive, it was the only way they could win! They were weak and frail, without natural armor or claws, they had no night vision, and they would willingly part with limbs! They had to be insane! I was not going to let the Human kill me! Being killed would mean I was weak!”
The Human inched back towards the control panel.
I raised the weapon he had given me, “Step away!” I shouted.
“You can’t make a sacrifice?” He asked, the stress in his voice displaying where the insanity was coming from.
“I’m not going to die!” I shouted.
The Human sighed and turned away from the console.
“Yes you are.”
The last image in my life was the Human raising the gun to my head.
~~~