Savage Earth / Season 1, Episode 5
Fractured Ground
Episode 5: Fractured Ground Dust stung Torren’s eyes as he crouched behind the crate, the air thick with the aftermath of the explosions. His ears rang, a high-pitched whine drowning out the world for a moment, but he could still feel the ground trembling beneath him, the aftershocks of the blast rippling through the cavern. The smell of scorched metal and something bitter, like burnt hair, clung to the back of his throat. He blinked hard, trying to clear his vision, and glanced at Mira beside him. Her face was smudged with grime, her chest heaving as she sucked in shallow breaths, but her eyes were sharp, darting toward the center of the chamber where the tendrils had been. “Think that got ‘em?” she whispered, her voice rough, barely audible over the ringing in his head. Torren didn’t answer right away. He shifted, peering over the edge of the crate, his fingers still tight around the jagged shard of metal he’d scavenged as a backup weapon. The chamber was a haze of smoke and debris, chunks of rock scattered across the floor, but in the dim light filtering from the cracks above, he could see movement. Not the writhing, purposeful thrashing of the tendrils, but something slower, more deliberate. A shape, humanoid but wrong, staggered out of the dust cloud....