Chapter 12: Alien Appetites
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As we descended deeper, the tunnel narrowed, and the air became thick with humidity and something else—a strange, acrid smell that reminded me of rotten eggs mixed with ammonia. Our footsteps echoed against the metal walls, each sound amplified in the confined space.
"This place gives me the creeps," Gwen whispered, staying close behind me.
"You're the one who insisted on coming," I reminded her but kept my voice low. The constant humming had grown louder, now a steady vibration beneath our feet.
The narrow passage suddenly opened into a massive cavern that stretched farther than I could see in the dim light. We had to walk for a few minutes before we found anything. And boy, did we find something.
I froze, holding my arm out to stop Gwen from rushing forward.
"Holy shit," I breathed.
The cavern was enormous—large enough to contain several houses. And indeed, that's exactly what it contained. Makeshift structures cobbled together from scrap metal and salvaged junk, beds, chairs, and tables arranged in what looked like a bizarre underground community.
But what really caught my attention was the massive spacecraft in the center.
It was sleek and metallic, with an organic quality. Half-buried in the cavern floor, it had glowing green tubes running from it like veins, pulsing with energy as they spread across the walls and ceiling.
And surrounding it all—eggs. Hundreds of them. Large, translucent sacs clustered in slimy mounds around the ship. Inside each one, shadowy forms shifted and squirmed.
The cavern walls glistened with moisture and faintly pulsed in shades of sickly green, cast by the ship's glowing tubes. Each drip of condensation hit the floor with an echo, intensifying the claustrophobic silence. Underfoot, the stone was slick with filmy residue, forcing every step to be deliberate.
"Ben, what are those things?" Gwen's voice trembled slightly, stepping closer to me.
A sick tremor ran through my gut at the sight of hundreds of pulsing alien eggs. They were translucent enough that I could see vague silhouettes writhing inside, shapes that might have been limbs—or something worse. I swallowed hard, forcing myself not to think about how many living creatures would die if I failed here.
"Transforming into aliens doesn't give me alien knowledge… but I suspect it's anything good," I replied, mind racing through my memories of the show. This seemed familiar, but something was different. "Let's get a closer look."
"Ewugh, maybe we should destroy all these eggs before aliens start popping out of them?" she suggested passingly as we moved.
I wonder how she'd feel to know there are humans inside. We traced cautiously along the edge of the cavern, staying in the shadows. My hand brushed against something etched into the wall—crude lettering carved into the stone.
"It says 'Morlock' here," I read aloud, tracing the letters with my fingertips. "What does that mean?"
"I don't know. But God, the smell… it's like a landfill mixed with rotting fish," Gwen whispered, pressing a sleeve against her nose.
"Cough... you two!"
A third voice called. Gwen and I spun around, my hand instinctively hovering over the Omnitrix.
A figure emerged from behind a pile of debris—a woman, limping badly. She was wearing a messy, torn white bodysuit. Her face was bruised, and her dark hair with pink highlights was matted with blood.
My eyes narrowed l as recognition hit me like a truck. "Jessica Jones?" I blurted before I could stop myself.
She flinched as if she was caught red-handed, "Uh," she winced as she shifted her weight. "D-do I know you, kid?"
Shit. Now that I think about it, she's in a superhero costume, probably hiding her identity. I recovered quickly even though it was hard to believe my eyes. I was interacting with a character like Jessica Jones!
She wore a torn white bodysuit that looked like a cheap superhero costume. This was definitely before she met Killgrave, and she was still doing her early superhero hobby.
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"No, I uh recognize you from... It's Patsy," I lied, trying to sound casual. "You were a child actress there, right?" I barely remembered. "Big fan... Are you okay?"
Jessica winced, realizing someone had recognized her in her hero costume.
She sighed in acceptance and dismissed the question with a pained grimace. "No, don't worry about me. You two need to run, right now. It's not safe here."
"We're not leaving without understanding what's going on," Gwen said firmly, walking over to help the lady stand straight. "You look like you're in trouble, just what's going on?"
Jessica cursed under her breath, eyes darting toward the eggs. She clutched her side, blood staining her torn bodysuit. Each ragged breath made her wince, but she forced herself upright, refusing Gwen's attempt to support her. "I'm fine," she insisted, though her voice cracked with pain. "Ugh, you guys should really leave."
Jessica sank against a jagged rock, gasping for breath. Her white bodysuit was stained a dark, rusty red where a deep cut bled sluggishly along her ribs.
"Jessica!" Gwen rushed over again, gently pressing a hand against the torn fabric. "God, you're bleeding—you're in no state to tell us to leave."
Jessica forced a wry grin, but her eyes fluttered. "I need to make sure you two civilians… won't get yourselves killed."
Her bravado faltered; she grimaced in pain, sucking in a sharp breath. I knelt beside the two of them. "That wound looks bad." I tried to keep my voice steady, but worry made it shake. She might end up dead. "We should wrap it, at least."
Gwen rummaged through her small backpack, extracting a roll of gauze she'd packed "just in case." With painstaking care, she worked to stem the bleeding, each hiss from Jessica's lips making me realize that the fight against these aliens wouldn't be easy.
"Tell us what happened," I said once she was stabilized, and she groaned.
"Fine. Since you don't understand the danger, I'll tell you. Quick version," she hissed, her back against a wall as Gwen sat beside her. "This colony belonged to the Morlocks—a group of mutants living underground, hiding from humans."
"Morlocks…?" Gwen trailed off.
"I don't know the details, but this group named themselves after characters from some old book. I was investigating disappearances tied to them when I found... this."
She gestured weakly at the eggs, her expression haunted. "There are these slug aliens who call themselves the Limax—they attacked the Morlocks, turned them into... food by the time I came here. Incubators for their young. I barely got away." She grimaced, touching a wound on her side. "And they won't let us leave easily."
I processed this information quickly. So this is why the Limax didn't attack Grandma's neighborhood in this world. They were busy with other food.
They seemed to be the same Limax from the original show, yes, but intersecting with the Marvel universe's Morlocks. This amalgamation world kept surprising me.
"Gwen," I whispered urgently, "I know we had an agreement, but take Jessica and get out of here. I can't let her see me transform."
Gwen scowled. "Ben, you can't—"
"Please," I insisted, meeting her eyes. "Trust me on this one."
She hesitated but finally nodded. Jessica looked between us like we were insane. "What are you two whispering about? Leave already! Don't worry about me, I can't leave with you. My blood will attract those things! They'll—"
A deafening roar cut her off, echoing through the cavern.
It was too late. Viscous shapes emerged from the shadows—massive, slug-like creatures sliding forward with surprising speed, their bodies glistening in the dim light.
They slithered forward en masse, their mucous-slick bodies dragging across the cavern floor with a wet scraping noise that sent shivers down my spine. A few among them were shaped like half-humans, like some twisted mermen.
"Too late," I growled, stepping in front of the girls. Perfect timing, as always.
"What are you doing?!" Jessica demanded as I raised my wrist, the Omnitrix already glowing green.
"Sorry about this," I muttered, twisting the dial to Diamondhead. I was lucky the Omnitrix had recharged by now. "Really hoped to keep a low profile, but..."
I slammed down on the dial, and a green light engulfed me. A familiar rush of transformation swept through me—bones hardened into crystal, skin became faceted and reflective, and muscle replaced with a living diamond.
"Diamondhead!" My voice resonated differently, deeper, and with a slight crystalline echo.
Jessica stared, mouth open. "What in the actual f—"
"No time!" Gwen shouted, pulling the stunned private investigator behind a collapsed pillar. "He knows what he's doing... mostly!"
The Limax shrieked, their slug-like bodies undulating as they surged toward me. I'd faced them before—at least, "Ben" had in the cartoon. I told myself that I'd be fine, but these Limax were different. They were larger, more aggressive, with jagged teeth inside their gaping maws.
"Let's see how you like a little crystal acupuncture," I taunted, extending my arm and concentrating.
One lunged, splattering acidic slime against my diamond skin. Heat prickled where it touched, and a cloud of acrid smoke rose as crystal and acid clashed.
I didn't let it come any closer. Shards of diamond shot from my fingertips like bullets, slicing through the first wave of aliens. They screeched as the crystals pierced their gelatinous bodies, green slime oozing from the wounds.
But they didn't fall. Instead, the wounds closed almost instantly, the slugs reforming and continuing their advance.
"Shit," I muttered. "Worth a try."
Three Limax lunged at once. I created a crystal barrier that they slammed against, their acidic bodies sizzling against my diamond skin. It stung but couldn't break through. I formed my arm into a blade, slicing through them, but again they simply reformed.
There were too many—at least twenty surrounding me now, more emerging from hidden tunnels. They began climbing over each other, forming a writhing mass that threatened to engulf me.
"Ben!" Gwen shouted from her hiding place.
She was being stupid by shouting, attracting their attention toward her. I had to finish them quickly. My eyes scanned the ceiling. The Limax hated water—it disrupted their molecular structure.
Limax acid hissed when it splashed against my crystalline forearms, leaving a patch of sizzling crystal. I gritted my teeth as I felt the heat. This body wasn't invincible.
My crystalline eyes spotted the rusted water pipes running overhead. These were old sewer lines that probably fed into the retirement community above.
"Time for a little plumbing work," I called out, raising both arms.
I fired a volley of razor-sharp crystal shards upward with precision. They sliced through the pipes like they were made of paper. Instantly, torrents of water blasted downwards, drenching everything below.
The effect was immediate and dramatic. The Limax screamed, their bodies smoking and bubbling where the water touched them. They tried retreating, but I directed more crystal projectiles at additional pipes, creating a downpour throughout the cavern.
"Keep away from the eggs!" I warned, noticing how the water made the translucent sacs contract and pulse more rapidly.
The Limax around me dissolved into puddles of steaming slime, their cohesion completely destroyed by the water. Their shrieks echoed throughout the cavern, growing fainter as more and more of them liquefied.
When the immediate threat was neutralized, I turned toward Gwen and Jessica. Water dripped from my crystalline body as I approached, each droplet catching light and refracting it in prismatic patterns.
Jessica was staring at me with a mixture of shock, disbelief, and grudging admiration. "Kid, I thought I'd seen everything in this city, but this..." She gestured vaguely at my transformed state. "This takes the damn cake."
Gwen stepped forward, water splashing around her shoes. "Welcome to my world," she said with a sigh.
I rolled my shoulders, crystal grinding against crystal. "I'm not a kid, you don't look much older than me. Anyhow, we're not done yet. There are still eggs—and probably more Limax in that spaceship. We need to finish this before they regroup or anyone else gets hurt."
Jessica pushed herself upright, grimacing from her injuries but with determination hardening her features. "Then let's get this done. There should be a few more around." She narrowed her eyes on me. "And afterward, maybe you'll explain what the hell is going on, crystal boy."
I shrugged, my diamond shoulders catching the dim light. "I don't think I'll do that. I forgot to ask, why a former actress in an underground colony?" I asked, watching her fall silent. "And look at that costume… Aren't you a superhero too? You're going by Jewel, right? No way, child actress Jessica Jones is a small-time superhero..."
Her face darkened, expression dry. "...Point taken. Let's find the rest of the aliens," she said, clearly not wanting to discuss her failing superhero career.
Together, we faced deeper into the cavern, water still raining down from the broken pipes, washing away the remnants of the Limax we'd defeated and melting the shells of the eggs. But I knew we'd only scratched the surface of this infestation.
Just as we were about to move, Gwen's breath caught in her throat. She pointed to a twitching shape slumped against the far wall, half-encased in the remnants of a ripped-open egg sac.
"Oh my god," she whispered, edging closer.
I had seen horror movies before. Ones where alien parasites burrowed into human hosts, twisting their bodies into something wrong. But this… this wasn't a movie.
The thing that had once been a person lay slumped against the wall, half-absorbed into what was left of a ruptured egg sac. Its arms—if you could call them that—were twisted at impossible angles, skin mottled with sickly, shifting colors.
It made a noise—a rasping, wheezing moan, like a breath sucked through shattered lungs. My first instinct was to run forward, to help, but I already knew.
There was no saving them.
Jessica turned away, her eyes squeezed shut. "They didn't just incubate them," she said in a low voice. "Some Morlocks were experimented on. I saw them do it. I think most of them will survive, but cases like this one will pass on soon."
"..." My stomach twisted. My first impulse was to help, but the finality in that rasping moan suggested it was too late. "They'll need real medical help," I muttered, forcing myself to look away. "We'll— we'll get someone down here."
Grandpa could surely call for help. "But first, we'd have to clear this place," I said, eyeing the spacecraft.
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Author Note: I know I know Jessica Jones is super random here, especially when she's apparently still doing her superhero gig, but I think that's how the plot's going to move in the story. As in, I'll pick out interesting episodes from the original and avoid boring ones (such as the Ripjaw and Kraken episode) and in the episode events, we'll indulge in different Marvel characters.
Sometimes big, something small like Jessica. Of course, that's only the 'start' of the story. We'll be moving onto original, more unique plotlines as the arcs settle themselves. I hope you're enjoying the story so far, do let me know in the comments your thoughts and ideas!
We were REALLY close to the goal today btw. Top 11, almost touched 10. Although we fell a bit down again, but it's a good sign since our followers are increasing, meaning each day we're closer to the goal.
I'm gonna make it better now.
If we are Top 10 by tomorrow, I'll post 2 chapters right away.
If we are Top 7 by tomorrow, I'll post 3 chapters right away.
Just for a little motivation. See you tomorrow!