Bringing his armored helm up and mentally setting it to internal air, he said “Iridal quickly seal this section and evacuate all air” into his comm. Finally standing and looking down at the twitching body he realized he couldn’t tell when the guy had died. Flames jumped to life here and there on the clothes but within moments Iridal was finally able to vent the oxygen from the compartment and the flames died quickly. Within the advanced view of the visor a small motion caught the corner of his eye. Looking down at his left arm he noticed an orange mess across the surface of the shield. It was dripping to the deck plating, which was what had caught his eye, and where it hit the deck; no, impossible. Holding his shield over the body he collapsed it back into its recess. The slop cascaded down across the body. He then re-expanded the shield to take a critical eye to it. There was scoring and pitting consistent with acid on metal all across the surface where the orange liquid had been. The armor and shield and the damn deck plates for that matter were designed to be impervious to corrosives; after all an acid burning a hole through one deck after another as it dropped further would be disastrous if it caused a hull breach. Just what was this chemical, It was powerful enough to eat through the deck-plates with no atmosphere.
Looking down the captain could see it eating through the deck. Thinking fast he activated the magnetic feature on his boots anchoring him to the deck-plate. “Iridal turn off the gravity to this section. Should slow this shit down enough so I can figure out how to deal with it.” “Captain with internal sensors down I am unable to determine what is happening.” From inside his armor he was unable to tell if the gravity had been deactivated at all. The body or the mushy puddle that was left of it was nearly fused to the deck. How to get rid of it? Fire, burn it out? That would mean re-pressurizing and fire in 0g was never a good thing, besides an atmosphere might accelerate its effects.
“We have some kind of corrosive agent, possibly an acid eating through the deck-plate. It can from Nah’s body as he began to..to, I don’t know how to describe it. He just boiled and cooked himself from the inside out. Liquefied his entire body and nearly all of his body armor. Only part that doesn’t seem to be deteriorating is one of his elbow braces. My visor is telling me its lined with very high traces of silicon but all I’m getting from this orange stuff is bio-matter, pure bio-matter with a question mark at the end of it.” “Silicon becomes incredibly brittle when applied with acid but will still melt with enough time emerged.” “No, It looks solid, not about to touch it yet though” the captain said standing up and taking a step back. “Then that isn't an acidic agent…” “But I’m standing right here watching it…” “I believe it’s an incredibly dense alkaline agent. Silicon as a base element is rooted in the alkaline area of the various elements. Also if it was alkaline it would make sense to be bio-matter. I can compute that an enzyme cascade could cause a run-away cellular and chemical breakdown within the body that could produce a corrosive like the one you’re describing.” “Ok now that you know what it is what do we do?” “Vinegar, douse it with Vinegar, a base of enzymes should respond best to that and should be neutralized, but be careful, it will produce toxic fumes.” “Then just keep pumping the air out.”
Running to the lift he instructed Iridal to allow him access to it. As the door open he and Cyriscel walked smack into each other as the wraith was coming out. Putting a hand to the tactical officers chest he pushed him back into the lift and against the far wall. Hitting the button for deck five they shot up to the top deck. Dragging the wraith out of the lift with him he immidiatly abandoned the officer has he dashed around the bar. Using its food protein sequencer he was able to fill a very large jug to the top with vinegar. As he ran back to the lift it sloshed and spilled small amounts here and there. Stepping from the lift the vinegar immediately began to float from the jug harden and crystallize as it froze.
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“We’re going to have to do this the hard way, re-pressurize and restore gravity." Moving quickly to the still bubbling orange puddle his suit picked up the faint sound of floating vinegar falling to the deck and shattering. There was air in the room but not much, sound waves couldn’t move very well through a light atmosphere and without much air there couldn't be much heat.Turning the jug upside down from chest height he instantly realized his mistake. As the vinegar poured down onto the orange crap it splattered hard sending both chemicals flying off in every direction. He managed to jump back, saving about half the jug as he did. Acrid fumes hissed from everywhere around him and it was hard to see much through them. ‘Damn it to Otar I just can’t fucking win for trying’ he thought to himself. He got low to the floor and being very careful where he placed each hand he located several small pockets of the gunk and doused them with the vinegar. Iridal was recycling the air now and as it cleared up he finally breathed a sigh of relief when he could no longer see any more traces.
Looking around making sure nobody else was on in the area he asked “Iridal are your internal sensors still down?” “Yes, is something wrong Captain?” “No I just wanted to thank you for your help, i managed to get it all. Just keep filtering the air for now it’s still pretty thick in here.” Checking one last time to make sure nobody else had been able to gain access to the area the Captain turned to the nearest wall and slammed his fist into it with all his might, the first was followed by a second, then by a third until blows were raining on the section of wall. Keeping a steady rate of breath and making sure not to make a verbal sound so Iridal had no way to know anything had happened the captain continued until he exhausted himself and collapsed to the deck with his back against the wall. Above him was a huge concaved dent in the wall about four feet wide and at least two deep.
As he slipped away into a momentary sleep the realization of just how close his crew had been to oblivion horrified him. On waking moments later the realization of just what they were going to need to do to survive, to make it back, to move on and save this galaxy would shake him to his very core.
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