Kyosuke stood in the middle of the room, still on his ass. His crew had reached their breaking point. They were going to fight and die, and it seemed to suit them quite well. It was something a crew of Star Army soldiers should do. Battle to the death, serve the Empire with pride and dignity, all of that.
It made him realize exactly how much of a soldier he was not. And how he was not interested in dying with the rest of them.
And so, as they slapped and punched slimy tentacles around, Kyosuke had his own plan. Hopefully they would follow. Maybe they wouldn't. But this was it. He wasn't going to die. He had his family to consider, his sisters, his dad. They needed money, they needed to survive, they needed him.
His eyes scoured the scene for a moment as he picked himself off the ground. And his eyes fell on Lucas, who seemed ready to join Luca in some capacity. For whatever good it would do.
Capacity.
The rubbing alcohol.
Alcohol.
Kyosuke's eyes returned to the light above them. A fat roll going through the floor nearly knocked him off his feet, but he was airborne before then. Staying in the center, he took out his flask; a couple swigs was all there was, but it was 50 proof, so it would do the job. He unscrewed the top and winced as a tentacle came at him from the grating.
It went for his face as he stretched a hand out to grasp the grate. Its razor teeth had to settle for his collar bone, which it frustratingly stopped on. Kyosuke's scream made him forget his plan for a second or two, but he made up for it, slashing the open flask across the grate.
The tentacle fled from the bloody gnaw marks it had made on Kyosuke. The grate did the same, disappearing from in front of the light. Kyosuke grabbed his injured chest and floated onto the hallway.
Fight-or-flight had kicked into his computerized brain; he was glad PNUgen had thought it fitting to leave that heuristic inside his brain. He peeled left and didn't look back, dashing down a hall as mental klaxons buzzed in everyone's brains.
The crew was on their own.