Ionus

         David finished putting on his work suit.  He was looking forward to another boring day mining.  He grabbed his drill and walked into the airlock.  As it pressurized, he looked out onto the surface of the asteroid Ionus.  It was in the center of the asteroid field and was very dangerous to mine, but they paid him well.  Titanium was rare enough that it was worth it. 
         As he walked out onto the hard, crater filled surface he waved to some co-workers.  He picked out a good spot, the inside of a large crater, and started vaporizing the useless minerals with his laser drill.  Near the end of his eight-hour shift he hit a vane.  It was huge, the biggest he had ever seen.  He started cutting it with enthusiasm and loading it into a hover cart. 
         He stopped to rest and looked up at the thousands of huge floating rocks that made up the asteroid field.  It was a silent, cold dance of giants.  The speck of sun could sometimes be seen between the giant rocks, witch seamed at times to him to be alive, dancing an endless ballet through the frigid expanse of space.  The carrier Ramoth could be seen occasionally between the drifting behemoths.  Of course, David thought to himself, we do all the work while the air force sits up there and enjoys the view.  He should not be complaining though.  He was paid well. 
         He went back to cutting.  This load would get him a bonus for sure.  As he loaded another chunk, he heard a loud crack, and then another.  He slowly tried to back up.  He radioed anyone in the area, “Ah, guys, I think I’m going to need some help here.”  A hidden cavern was bad news.  Someone had died just last week falling though one.  Another crack, and then the ground under his feet gave way, he was falling. 
         He hit the ground on his feet, the robotic part of his suit taking most of the damage.  He hoped that someone had heard him.  He turned his spotlights on.  He lit up two small circles on the caves wall.  It was very dark.  He could almost feel the darkness trying to suffocate him.  Another chunk of rock fell next to him.  He needed to move before the cave fell on top of him.  So he started walking the only way he could, deeper into the cave. 
         His two beams of light peered into the dark expanse of this hole he was trapped in.  A rumble suddenly shook the ground and he was thrown to his feet.  He looked back and could not see any light, he was trapped.  He stood there for a second, paralyzed by fear.  Was he going to die down here?  He started walking again, quickly glancing about.  It seemed as if the walls were getting closer and closer together.  All he could hear were his own footsteps reverberating down the tunnel.  Clung, Clung, Clung, Clung.  He walked down endlessly though the darkness.  It clung to him like a shroud, his two beams of light invading the domain of this darkness.  His hair stood on end, it was as if the darkness was a creature, breathing, caressing the air around him.  The silence put him on edge. 
         Then his lights caught a glimmer of something, just a few yards from him.  David stopped dead in his tracks.  He slowly moved forward till he could see what is was.  It was a crystal growing out of the floor of the cave.  It did not reflect any light around it.  David cautiously walked past it too find more.  Soon he was walking through a field of the crystals, lost in a meandering maze. 
         The darkness crept up on him from every side and he felt the cave watching him.  Some times, out of the corner of an eye, he would see the darkness move, or a crystal shift.  He did not know how long he wandered in the malicious cave, but it must have been days.  Then he found something different.  It was a relief to see something other than walls and crystals.  And the darkness, there was always the darkness.  He saw in front of him a perfect sphere of Titanium; it was riddled with notches and cracks.  It looked as though something had clawed it’s way out of it from some hidden crevasse within.  The broken thing was, with a closer look, not really spherical, but the cracks and crevasses made it more of an oval shape. 
         The darkness gathered around this thing more than anywhere else, the titanium should have been reflecting the light from his spotlights, but instead it bent away from it and whatever touched it was sucked in to never come out.  David feared this thing.  How did it get here?  The darkness must have created it.  His greatest enemy, this creature with only the will of death.  David thought if there was such a place that god housed his angel of death, this would be it.  More like a prison that a home though.  His tomb, yes that was what is was.  He would die here, because of this thing in front of him, this misshapen creation of the darkness.           Rage surged through him; he hated the darkness and its creations.  He took out his drill.  He must destroy the thing, the creation.  He hacked it, destroyed it.  It was a thousand pieces at his feet.  This creation would plague him no more.  But something was wrong.  He was standing in a pile of liquid and chunks of the titanium.  No, it was not titanium, what was it?  Fear welled up inside him, what had he done? 
         Then he heard it, felt it coming.  He turned and ran.  His movements spurred on by the fear of it.  He looked back and saw the Darkness standing over the remains of its creation.  He ran, tripped and pulled himself off the ground.  He ran and ran.  He knew the darkness would find him, it always did.  This dark angel, his prison guard, tormenter and destroyer.  Light!  It was up ahead, but Darkness was coming, could he reach it? 
         Then his heart sank in despair.  No not a way out, but his co-workers.  They were looking for him.  He yelled for them to run. The Darkness, the darkness.  It would kill them all.  He yelled but they would not listen.  They tried to calm him.  He was fine.  They did not believe him until it came. 
         One man screamed in pain as a spine was shot though his leg.  The blood splattered onto the floor.  They all ran, his screaming ended abruptly.  Another man fell to the ground, he did not get a chance to scream.  The darkness chased them, and only two of them made in to the surface.  They ran to the dome.  It was safe; the light would face off the dark and drive if away. 
         David reached the airlock.  He looked back, the other man was far back and it was coming closer.  He cold not wait.  He closed the airlock door, silence again.  He waited as he was pressurized.  He had to warn everyone.  The darkness, they must get away.  Bam!  The thing was there.  It tried to get in.  The door was bending, twisting under its blows. 
         David ran.  There were not too many people living there but he yelled for them all to run, It was going to get in he screamed.  People tried to stop him; they grabbed him and held him down.  They did not understand.  He felt a prick in his arm and then he went limp. 
         When David woke up he was lying on a medical cot.  It was dead silent.  He could not ever remember a time in his lifetime that he had been in a silence such as this, it was audible.  He got out of the bed and walked to the door.  Where was the Darkness?  He knew it was here somewhere.  It would get in, they could never stop it, never.  His only hope was to get to the communications center and call for a transport to get them out. 
         He walked swiftly down the corridor, nervously glancing about.  Where was everyone?  And he knew the darkness was here, somewhere, watching him.  Then he stopped, fear over took him as he saw several lights out in the corridor ahead.  Glass covered the ground and a smashed chair was on its side.  There was a trail of smeared blood leading away from it.  David was shaking with fear.  But he had to continue, it was the only way away. 
         He walked slowly down the dark corridor.  He was extremely tense.  The Darkness could be in any of the dark rooms on the side.  He was stepping in pools of blood now, other smears had connected with the one he had been following and he thought it was like a river of blood leading him to the underworld.  All of the streams converged into a set of doors.  The smell of death was heavy in the air.  It was the cafeteria.  When he looked inside he could not help but turning and vomiting. 
         Everyone was dead, Everyone.  Dismembered and gutted bodies were hanging from the ceiling.  The ceiling, the walls, and the floor were covered in blood.  It was everywhere and they all were dead.  He had tried to warn them, now they hung, trophies to the Darkness.  He had to get out. 
         He started running as fast as he could, the darkness would be here, and he ran.  Then he heard it, a low hissing; a vent exploded behind him and the darkness was there. Its serpentine body twisting out of the vent system.  Its tail whipped forward and slashed him in the back.  He could not stop running. 
         He could see the communications room.  He ran inside and contacted the carrier.  But then he felt the warmth and numbness flooding his body.  Venom paralyzed him and as the carrier’s officer came on and asked what he needed, he could not move, or say anything. 
         The Darkness slowly came up behind him.  He saw himself being dragged backwards, his blood smearing the ground underneath him.  This was it, David thought, Ionus was his tomb.