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He could see it now, they would come to the planet thinking it a barren, frozen wasteland. They wouldn't believe him. But when they realized that the planet held much to be valued, he would get permission to bring more advanced equipment onto the planet, so he could research the life more thoroughly.
He would get his own team of scientists to help him.
He would become the most important astronaut of his generation.
Even now, as he daydreamed, the corrosive chemical was invading his suit. He couldn't have been bothered to check his suit's condition on his wrist Data Bar.
Around him, he could see to an unbelievably vast, snow covered horizon as he glided closer to the ground.
Then the world came apart and a bellow shook the universe. Not the bat's. Something bigger. Much bigger. Compared to this bellow, the bat's sounds were of a frightened kitten.
The valuable life bellow along with the ground expand upwards and exploded into a raining flurry of dirt, rock, and grass.
From the explosion, appeared a titanic creature—unbelievably so—what looked to be a hulking worm the size of a skyscraper, maybe bigger. Its earth-shaking blustering, one which could never be matched, sounded from its massive maw. Its mouth was tubular, like that of a leech and held rows upon rows of equally massive teeth.
It completely obliterated all life in its way.
The ginormous worm made the space lose his grip on reality. His senses were out the metaphorical window, along every memory he had of who he was. Nothing was left but an empty shell staring down at oncoming doom.
His mind sealed away everything, then his conscience abstracted itself. He watched absently as his imminent death approached. He watched the monstrous worm from a blank space where no thoughts existed. Only a numb reflection of fear. As he stared from that place between time, between consciousness, between feelings, he lost his cool.
He screamed. As loud as he could. He didn't feel any better, but he went ahead anyways.
The worm's open maw loomed not far below him, so his instincts took control. He turned his jets on full power. Even though it wasn't enough to propel him upwards, he suspected it would give him enough power to pass over the worm.
He gave his jets all the power they could handle, but they came short. They should be stronger than they were. They weren't giving enough push.
Something was wrong with his jets and it was going to cost him his life if he didn't fix it.
He became intensely aware of the skin at his ribs being vulnerable to the wind, as if his suit was open at his side. When he looked to it, he saw, with surprised eyes, that his suit had been ripped by something. He hadn't noticed before. It looked as something had taken a giant bite out of his suit, but for some reason he wasn't bitten along with it. His skin was exposed, though not damaged, and, to his horror, the rip continued on to his pack. It had probably damaged his jets.
There was green foam around the edges of the rip.
Checking his Data Bar, he realized that his pack and his suit was deteriorating from a corrosive chemical that was invading his suit. Apparently, the acid had been eating his suit for quite some time, but because his helmet was off, he failed to be notified. It seemed that the corrosive effects of the chemical had no effect on his skin.
Because of the damage to his pack, it couldn't use all its power and he was left in a predicament.
He was running out of time—if he didn't find a way to clear the volcano-sized mouth bellow him, then he would die.
He scrambled to slow his decent as he activated the emergency air-brakes all over his suit. It didn't do much.
The dark abyss of yellow flesh drew nearer.
He forced himself to focus, this was what he had trained for. He couldn't let his fear get the better of him.
The giant worm was moving towards him.
He couldn't let it control him—his fear.
It was like the size of a country, he thought.
He questioned why was this happening to him.
It got closer.
He didn't want to die. He wanted more than anything for the giant worm to just deflate and for his ship to take him off this planet safely.
Even closer.
He thought about how his mouth was really dry. That's not important, he thought. And what about the ants on the ground? Were they killed? On that subject, when was the last time the worm ate a meal? Was he starving, or did he have an abundance of food, and this was an appetizer to him? What's wrong with me? Why am I thinking these things? The space man wondered if he'd taste good to the worm.
“Ah! Stop it!” he yelled at himself.
He forbore his will and clung to what little courage he could find in his reeling conscience.
He estimated how far he could make it, calculating in his head his chances of survival. When he came to the quick conclusion that there was no way for him to clear the beast with his jets, his mind began to race with panic again.
Again, he forced himself to calm down. He needed to get away from the worm, but he couldn't because his jets were damaged.
Like a rude slap to the face, he realized the answer. Its teeth. He could land on a tooth. They were huge, they could easily hold him. All he had to do then was climb over the lip of the massive mouth.
After that he'd be home free.
Even making it to a tooth would be close. He crossed his fingers, because passed the tooth was death, he was sure of that.
The worm was arching through the air, very gradually becoming parallel with the ground.
If the worm became parallel with the ground, it would be impossible for him to make it across the tooth at all, for the tooth he was aiming for would be pointing down, and he'd be climbing vertically.
Just before he could touch down on the tooth, one of his jet failed and he dropped.
He grasped at the air for something solid. Only barely, he grabbed onto the end of the tooth with one hand, then forced his other hand around the slimy surface to keep himself from slipping off. It could have easily been the size of a full-grown pine tree.
The second hand wasn't helping, he was still slipping off.
Quickly, he let go with his arm that didn't have the Data Bar and he pushed two buttons at his wrist, turning his gloves onto sticky grip mode. Microscopic-thin blades outcropped from the palms of his gloves a mere millimetre and dug into the slimy surface of the tooth.
He reached up his other arm onto the pale yellow tooth and lifted himself up.
He started across the slippery surface of the tooth. With the friction function for his boots still on from his climb up the tree, he wouldn't slip so easy. The worm was half way to the peach of its arch, meaning that the tooth was now diagonal. If only he had chosen to glide to the other side of the mouth, then he could simply slide to the end of the tooth. He would have to climb.
Because of the angle, he had to use his hands to aid him as he climbed.
Even though with every step he took, the tooth's surface got steeper, he would have to hurry. Once the tooth was vertical, he would have to use his daggers to help him and he doubted they could pierce into the tooth.
Rushed by a sense of oncoming doom, he reached the end of the tooth and scrambled to climb the flesh of the creature's mouth.
Once at the the wall of flesh, he didn't waste a single second. He took out the climbing daggers and began to climb the lip of the creature.
Unluckily, when he moved to the surface of the mouth, he was almost climbing upside down.
The blades clung to the flesh well, but they weren't made for climbing upside down, so he came close to falling at times.
In a bizarre twist of gravity, he eventually found himself climbing towards the ground.
As he approached the top of the lip, he didn't even notice his tiredness due to his fear and adrenaline. He was almost there.
Almost away from death. He pushed himself hard for the last bit—he had to make it out of this alive, he thought.
Then suddenly, he was there, at the top of the lip.
He pulled himself over in victory. The worm was plummeting toward the ground now and all that was left to do was push off the mouth and use his jet packs to land safely.
With naked clarity he realized that his jet packs had stopped working. Sitting upside down on the worm's massive lip and a dagger stabbed into the lip to keep him from floating away, he checked his wrist for his jet-pack's condition. Sure enough, the pack was too damaged to operate.
He brought up information on the damages then came up with a solution in a flash. He could fix it.
Sweat rolled down his brow as he made the changes from his wrist controller. Then, with time running short, he started up his jet-pack, now powered by his reserve fuel—his solar pack.
The roaring of the jets engine was music to the space man's ears.
He braced himself to get out of the worm, when realized much too clearly that he had no chance at surviving from the start. A jet pack wasn't going to save him here.
He wasn't going home.
The worm was half a second from meeting the ground and he was caught between the two. There was no time. He hadn't had enough time. Not enough time. If only he had had more time.
He closed his eyes and he didn't feel the next part. All he could feel was his heart stopping.
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