"No power," sneered Gerardo, as his repeatedly hit the buttons on the elevator console. "The fuck?"

The footsteps were coming nearer, and though Henderson was shining his torch to and throe, their owner could not be seen. Just more wobbling shadows, stretching at them like menacing black fingers.

"Identify yourself, God damnit," Henderson shouted. A hefty wrench trembled in his hand, whilst the other attempted to stem the flow of blood from his head. 

"We're not getting out of here," Gerardo said, stepping away from the console. "We're going to have to deal with this ourselves." 

"I can't, man, oh Jesus, can't you get it to work?" Henderson stuttered in a fit of delirium. Gerardo guessed his wound had pushed him into a state of shock, and the creepy footsteps were adding to the payload of cognitive interference. 

Shaking his head, Gerardo didn't bother replying. He added his flash light to the fight, and advanced past Henderson. Even he was unnerved. One second the footsteps came from his left, splashing heavily in water, and then as he shone his light in that direction, they shifted off to the right. Was there two guys down here? That'd explain how they managed to open up Eddie. The memory of the canteen massacre sent Gerardo into a rage. He wasn't about to share Eddie's fate.

"You fucks want some of me, eh?" Gerardo shouted, growing increasingly violent. He swung his metal fist into a mobile work table, and bent the thing right in the centre. "Get out here so I can do that to your skulls!"

"Are you insane!?" Henderson screamed. 

"Just watch my back, Henderson. We'll be fine," Gerardo half-lied. 

The radio at his hip cackled to life, and he cursed himself. Why hadn't he thought of it?

"G**ardo, Hend***n, come in. Wha ****Hydroponics?", it was Tito.

Wasting no time, Gerardo wipped up the device and held down the sending button. "Tito, get Security down here. We've got two unidentified personnel down here, causing a mess and putting the fear of God into us. The elevator has lost power, and the A.I is refusing to sound the alarm." 

Henderson screamed, again. Gerardo turned behind him and froze; his mouth hanging open to release a barely audible gasp. 

Henderson was suspended three feet into the air, and clutching at his neck. A silhouetted figure, with a slightly hunched back, and what Gerardo guessed to be soem kind of gas mask, stood with one hand wrapped around the engineer's throat. Everything fell deafly quiet, save for the gurgling sounds coming from Henderson.

"Put him down, you piece of shit," Gerardo snapped, getting control of himself. He was not dying today, no sir. 

He ran forwards and swung his metal hand at the figure; but its other limb came up and caught his wrist with an iron tight grip. He struggled furiously to free himself, but then his feet suddenly left the floor as his attacker picked him up. He found himself face to face with not a mask, but something foreign, something... alien. 

"Gok rik ta," it said, in a voice reminiscent of a bucket of worms. 

Then he was flying through the air, the plant beds barely visible shot past him below. He was about to scream in a mixture of terror and dread when he descended, and crashed into a bank of nutrients bags. He tried to pick himself up; his head was throbbing with concussion, and he noticed his metal hand had been ripped out of its housing. With blurred vision, he looked towards the elevators, and saw the [i]thing[/i] still had hold of Henderson. 

There was a scream, and then the lights came back on. Everything, water pumps and purifiers, hummed to life. Gerardo fell into unconsciousness. 

"Systems are now online and operational, Mr. Valdez. Good work," the computer's almost mocking tone was the last thing he remembered.