Alien: Isolation (1st POV Ripley Edition)

#6

With an eerie silence and a hallway where the lights come on, I arrive at another part of the hallway with a gas leak. Progress.

Next console, code to open safe with code and card that opens further doors. Like a machine, I do one, two and three. Will my efforts like this pay off? Or will I fail at some point and...no, I reject such thoughts. I open the next door and move on. Fifteen meters from me I see the dark grey form of a two-meter humanoid and I shudder. But it's turned away from me and doesn't see me. However, not knowing his biology, I'm open to all possibilities - including the fact that even though it doesn't have eyes in the front, nor in the back of his head, he might see or register objects from all areas of his head. Like a wide array sensor of some kind.

Anyway, I retreat behind a chest of drawers and wait for it to walk away. In the last few hours, I have become very experienced with these kinds of situations and know how to judge when it is my opportunity to sneak and when to hide.

***

I have it! I grabbed the first aid kit!

But it was not easy to get it. In order to do that, I had to sneak through a bunch of corridors, several dozen armed men (all of whom were dead when I went through the same path again), and use the tuner to activate consoles, closed doors, and so on...

So even though I'm new to Sevastopol, I still manage to navigate the station. Especially thanks to the terminals with illuminated floor plans of certain parts of the station.

And so now I'm walking down an eerily quiet corridor towards a console at the end of one of these several long corridors to activate the console to open a door in the corridor far behind me.

Funny, how the opening of the door is intended. All through activations on consoles, pressing of switches, connectors and the like. A few hours here and I'm in over my head with this station.

The motion detector is picking up movement north-west of me. The green dot literally flies across the screen. So, everything expected. Monster rushes through the ventilation ducts and sure is having a good time. All right, just don't jump out in front of me.

Although I'm ready, of course. I have a moltov cocktail, a pipe bomb and a smoke bomb. Considering the creature is extremely quick on its feet, I hope I'm capable enough to reach out and aim at it within a second or less. Yes, it is important to keep your equipment close at hand.

I arrive in a room with androids in stand-by mode and a console that I need to activate in order to open the door on the other side of the medical wing and leave this place. But I'm careful, because there are two suspicious black openings to my left and right, so I'm careful when I step.

To my left I see another phone booth with card slots and I just shake my head. Pointless thing. I can easily imagine that in another universe things like this could be game progress savers - and my adventures in that case should be a game for someone who enjoys these horror experiences.

I'm just shaking. I wouldn't want anyone to experience what I'm experiencing, especially not in the form of a game. I hack the console and as I do so, an android comes out of the chamber and walks towards me. At the last moment I shock him with the EMP baton and head towards the now unlocked part of the medical wing. Everything around me hums and roars with warning sounds - I don't know for what reason. Perfect to drown out the loud movement of the monster above me. But I'm going slowly and without haste. Smart, because I see that there is a ventilation duct above me every few steps (as if there weren't so many of them before!) and every few steps I see saliva dripping from them. Yeah, it won't be able to get me. I avoid vents and monster saliva. Finally, I reach the door that I spent a full 30 minutes sneaking around these medical areas for.

The neck opens and I see a ladder on the console...and a creature! It jumps in front of me, finds me, straightens up and roars while I fall on my back in terror and crawl backwards. It's over! I can't get out of this trouble! My gear...I failed... It is to close to me to aim! I...

An explosion flashes behind the creature and everything goes black.

Somehow, incomprehensible, I rise to my feet and open my eyes. Fire is burning all around me and the room is getting hotter. It didn't leave a trace, the fire apparently chased him away. But what happened?

The answer is obvious. A bunch of people who were here before (perhaps the ones now killed in the corridor) have apparently set up a trap for whoever opens this room. Explosive devices that are activated by movement in the vicinity. Obviously, with some time delay, but it worked. It saved my life!

I'm not too excited and thoughtful about it, so I just move on. I take my gear and first aid kit and put them in a small backpack over my shoulder. I look around. Where now? Up the ladder. And I'm climbing. It's not easy, because I'm exhausted. But I'm progressing step by step...I almost fall once, but I catch myself. Soon I'm in the ventilation ducts away from the fire, moving quietly with the motion detector in my left hand and the pipe bomb in my right.

Nothing on the screen. The creature is not around. Or is it just motionless waiting for me to show up? But I don't experience any problems and soon I reach the next level. Upper or lower, I have no idea.

And new troubles are ahead of me. To my left is an elevator, but with one drive cylinder that is missing. Guess who has to find it? And it won't be easy, I conclude. Because ten meters from me there are four armed men patrolling around a console. And nothing surprising, there are also several ventilation opened spaces in the vicinity nearby.

I take a few moments of rest and gather my strength. I can do this, for Taylor and Samuels! Okay. I devour one of my few remaining energy bars.

I decide to throw a smoke bomb and slip between them - quickly and like a shadow, but without running. I'll walk quickly, but quietly.

I smile. It won't be easy, but I've been through worse difficulties so far.

I continue, with the hope that I will see Taylor and Samuels soon and that - somehow - we will all get out of this nightmare alive.