The evil Morren informs Defender Zik that his five minute grace period is over. That means one of the hostages has to go. As he climbs, Zik warns Morren one last time to cease his aggression, but to no avail! Morren pulls the trigger, spelling doom for one of the poor hostages! Zik abandons caution and engages his jetpack, but it’s too late! One of his employees is obliterated!
The barrage of grenades launched by Morren Mallor begins impacting the crater peak right above Defender Zik and Dakaasin! As the dislodged rubble falls, Dak is unlucky and is struck by a large boulder! Fortunately, the lower gravity on this moon prevents a fatal impact, but she falls from her position halfway up the cliff!
Firing up her rocket boots, Dak guides herself to a safe landing, but she grips her shoulder in agony. A worried Zik calls down to her to see if she’s okay, and she reports that she’s got a dislocated shoulder, but is otherwise all right. But with any further climbing or combat out of the question, she urges Zik to carry on without her. Your favorite space hero is going to have to rescue the hostages on his own, facing down a mortal enemy armed with a grenade launcher!
Defender Zik and Dakaasin are out of immediate danger, as they stay close to the side of the cliff that Morren and the other sniper, Rick, can’t see. They attach some ropes to the cliff and keep their jets off to make them even harder to locate as they climb the central peak of the crater. At the top, three frightened hostages await their fates!
But Morren isn’t so easily dissuaded! Adapting quickly to Zik’s ploy, Morren prepares a grenade launcher, and begins launching grenades at the peak to dislodge his mortal enemy!
Defender Zik, now alone in the cave and out of contact with the others, gets his rock climbing gear ready. Reasoning that using his jetpack is too risky under the circumstances, he unwinds the carbon fiber nano-mesh cable in his gauntlets and prepares to descend into the tunnel Mizhakwan fell into.
As he rappels into the crevasse, he calls out to Mizhakwan, who is finally able to answer! She assures Zik that she’s fine, it just took a few moments for her to figure out her burst transmission settings. Not only is she okay, she’s ecstatic!
Zik discovers the reason Mizhakwan is so overjoyed as he reaches the bottom; there’s a cavern absolutely packed with glowing crystals! Sitting cross-legged in the back of the cavern, Mizhakwan cautions Zik to be careful where he steps, to avoid damaging the crystals. Mysteriously, several crystals are pointing spikes directly at Mizhakwan. When Zik enquires why, she replies with a confident “Watch!”
As Zik and Amelia finish listening to Metallica, they get back into Zik’s story about the deadly spinning asteroid and it’s direct trajectory towards his home planet Zoz.
Zik’s strategy to spin his ship to match the rotation of the asteroid and land at the pole worked! He was able to land safely, anchor his mining ship, and fire up the powerful engines to begin pushing the asteroid on a new trajectory to hopefully nudge it away from Zoz.
In the meantime, though, his friend Ramesh is in serious trouble after that crash landing! Zik is unable to get into contact with Ramesh, meaning that he’s incapacitated somehow. Quickly donning his breathing and grappling gear, Zik prepares to save Ramesh!
Just in case his mining ship gets dislodged from the asteroid, Zik anchors himself to the hull. He carefully makes his way across the surface of the asteroid. It’s spinning so quickly that the stars appear to be whizzing through the heavens! Indeed, the closer he gets to the equator, the faster the rotation is, and eventually there isn’t even any gravel or stones left on the ground.
By the time Zik is near Ramesh’s ship, the force of the spin pulling him away from the asteroid is greater that it’s limited gravity, and up and down have reversed themselves! Zik is now fighting to stay attached to the asteroid, hoping that his grappling gear is strong enough to hold him!
