One final shout-out to: Guest, andrea1301, LizabethScissors, and Love2Write21.

And before you begin reading the final chapter of Don't Sleep Until You're Dead, here's something you should know: the Chillsnare was a girl.

CHAPTER 14
Jade's POV

"André!" I screamed, watching his lower half, the legs and part of his waist, slump to the ground as the Chillsnare tilted its head back, swallowing the upper half noisily, forcing it all the way down. André Harris was gone. He was dead.

That should be me cut in half. I should've been the dead one.

The Chillsnare rolled its good eye, pulling its mouth into a malicious grin. I backed away, fleeing towards Cat. She was crying loudly in pain and the loss of her boyfriend. The alien began approaching us like before. Didn't André dump the poison? Why was it still alive?

I knelt down and pulled Cat into my arms. She buried her bloody face in my shoulder, shaking and sobbing violently. I snatched the gun from her hip and shot a few times at the Chillsnare. It groaned and roared but didn't stop.

So we were all going die.

I wasn't expecting this to happen. The Chillsnare was supposed to be dead at this point. I was supposed to be the sacrifice, not André. Tears fell down my face as I cuddled Cat close, rubbing her back gently.

The Chillsnare's tongue hung out of its mouth, panting as if it suddenly became exhausted in walking those ten feet closer to us. It bowed its head, drool dripping in bubbling ropes. Looking up, I made eye contact and the creature bellowed like a whale, leaning back to 'sit' and it wrapped its many tentacles around its stomach, whining softly. Foaming spit and blood in its mouth, teeth glistening with saliva, it lunged for a last time.

It was going to kill (and possibly eat) Cat and me, then go upstairs and find Beck. He was completely defenseless so that would be easy I hated to admit. I squeezed my eyes shut, Cat tightening her arms around me. NASA was going to have a lot of trouble explaining to the public what had happened to the six volunteer astronauts that didn't return to Earth because of an 'alien,' which I knew half of the world didn't even believe in the existence of.

The Chillsnare suddenly thudded into the ground, going limp and its jaw cracking against the floor. I opened my eyes. It was lying flat on its stomach; tentacles curled and twisted beneath its heavy body, tongue sticking out on one side and covered with dark liquids. The single eye was still open, glassy and a dull yellow.

Was it dead? Had the poison kicked in just in time?

I pulled away from Cat, hesitantly shoving my boot against the creature's noise. Some fluids were gushing from between its steak-knife teeth; on a closer look I saw it to be blood. But, maybe this was some sort of play-dead trick. It was going to wait until I wasn't paying attention and then tear me to pieces like it did to André.

"Is it dead?" Cat choked out.

"I…I think so. Come one. Let's hurry and fix this stupid machine so we can get the heck out of here." Cat wiped her of the blood that kept spilling and I took a screwdriver in my hand, not having a single idea of what I was doing.

"Put it there and twist," Cat pointed helpfully.

I inserted the tip into the top of a screw and secured it tightly into place. My fingers got zapped and cut up so badly they started bleeding and my nails were ragged and uneven. I was going to have a lot of scars from this trip. Actually, we all would; both physically and emotionally.

When Cat felt that we had finished, we stood back, watching in awe as she pressed a single button and the machine hummed to life, a bright glow coming the inside and practically illumination the whole room. That was all we needed to do for now. The other machines to help Berglemir specifically were left untouched, not wanting to waste any more time.

I was forced to leave the other half of André's body down in the energy room with the dead carcass of the Chillsnare. In no way would I be able to lug it all the way down to the Jovian, and I feel like he would've wanted to either 'go home in one piece or leave whatever was left where it was.' It ripped my heart apart knowing that he had sacrificed his life when I had decided I would instead.

We retrieved Beck on his gurney in the wall's secret compartment. The tears sparkled on his face when he saw me again in full form, only bleeding a little with various bruises and a tight smile on my lips. Cat waved to him as she opened the gate to the Jovian. His eyes searched for the third person, one of his best friends, and failed to find him. I looked directly at Beck.

"I'm sorry, dear. He didn't make it," I whispered. He was the sacrifice.

If Beck had the strength, he would've thrown a fit that destroyed the whole hall. His eyes rolled in his head madly and his breathing sped up. His stump and arm smashed against the metal gurney and he was trying to scream under the oxygen mask. Cat pumped a sedative through the machine and it quieted him enough to move him safely onto the rocket ship.

The Jovian was a welcome sight. The lights were fully intact and so was the engine. It was musty and cold, just the way the six travelers that started out had left it. Now there were only three. Half of the number would be returning.

Cat situated Beck in the back where his gurney was firmly tied down and he would remain asleep for the rest of the trip home. I sat down in the pilot's seat, realizing how long it had been since I was in this position. Normally, I would never fly. It would be Robbie…or André…or Beck…

Shaking my head, I pressed the communication button and a fuzzy voice began speaking frantically to me. "NASA to the Jovian, you have made successful contact. Report what has happened please."

It was the frantic voice of Trina Vega. How in the world were we going to tell her that her baby sister was dead? "NASA to the Jovian, do you copy?"

"Loud and clear," I replied, Cat sitting down next to me, various patches across her place to hold the bleeding off until she could get stitches. "We're coming back home. And you're not going to believe the story we have to tell."

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After I pretty much crash-landed the Jovian onto the NASA runway, almost thirty people forced their way onboard to help. Beck was taken to the emergency room while Cat was brought in to get stitches for her face. The doctors insisted I go with them for a double check-up.

The last news I heard, Beck was now put in a stable condition. The doctors had tried over twenty different antibiotics to flush the Chillsnare's poison out of his system and even still had not managed to find one that worked on its own. They ended up combining three medications and it worked fine. Cat was refusing to leave her hospital room and didn't want to talk to anybody about what happened on Berglemir. I guessed she just wanted to be alone and was struggling to get over the loss of André.

Speaking of which, a new, small group of astronauts were heading up to Berglemir to fix it up and clear it out. I warned them of the horrors they might find and they nodded grimly, understanding that it was their job to make sure the Chillsnare (as it was officially named) didn't lay eggs and wasn't about to reproduce and create an entire army of cold-blooded killers.

The public and media were interested in hearing our story directly; so in three months we had set up to do a worldwide interview with anyone who wanted to listen over the web and various news channels that would be streaming live from our video. We were asked to write our own personal speeches to present with at the end.

Our appearances hadn't changed dramatically, with the exception of Beck. I had ten thin scars on my forearms from Tori and was doing everything I could to get rid of them, because every time I saw them I could see Tori's tear-stained face as I let go of her and the Chillsnare took her out into space to consume.

Cat's face was marred with the scratches from the Chillsnare itself, but since her treatment came sooner than mine (I had the gashes for a longer time), hers were already half-faded thanks to the proper medications and healing. She usually wore a little more make-up than normal, and was working with me to find a solution to erase the scars completely.

Beck was fitted with a prosthetic left arm at his elbow. He attended therapy every day to learn how to function it like a normal arm and was very happy with the results. Since we had managed to save our wedding rings, we put his on his robot finger, proudly showing off how we both managed to beat the odds and stay together even with a monster trying to kill us.

A memorial was set up at NASA to honor our three friends who didn't make it back. The ship that had traveled to Berglemir retrieved the remains of André's body, as well as the Chillsnare's so research could be conducted on a real alien. André had his legs and waist buried in his coffin, while Tori and Robbie had articles of clothing and items in their graves.

Trina Vega quit her job the moment she learned Tori was dead. She was furious that NASA had not done anything sooner when they first learned that there was no signal coming from the space station, claiming that if they had acted earlier, they might've been able to save her. I couldn't argue with her reasoning, but NASA had their petty regulations after all, and pulled out contracts to show that Tori had known the risks she was taking being a volunteer of the program. So Trina walked out the door and never came back.

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For the interview, we were allowed to wear casual clothes, mostly so we would be comfortable and it would help cover our scars. I wore long sleeves to hide my arms, but Beck chose to wear a polo shirt, completely exposing his fake limb. Cat put on a pair of big sunglasses, managing to hide about half of her scarred face behind it, and then she had a bunch of make-up thrown on the scars that did show.

We were herded into a single, dark room, surrounded by almost a dozen cameras to broadcast on the different news stations all over the world. Sitting down in the chairs, we tried to stay calm and make ourselves comfortable. An assistant came up and offered us water and towels. After that, it was thirty seconds until show time. We were reminded to be ourselves and not be afraid to let our emotions out.

The host, a nice man from some European country, came over to sit with us. The 'on-air' sign blinked red, and he smiled, looking into one camera and saying, "Here with me today are the surviving three astronauts from the space station Berglemir, which during its most recent orbit was overtaken by a vicious space alien called 'Chillsnare…'"

We patiently answered questions that came from people calling in and shooting e-mails to the filming studio. Many of them consisted of how we managed to kill the Chillsnare, after explaining how strong its skin was, and some of the unread comments consisted of how the Chillsnare didn't truly exist and we were making up the whole story for publicity.

I wished that had been the case, because the true tale I was telling was not something I would've been able to make up on my own in a million years.

At the end of the two hours, we were allowed to give our individual speeches of a deeply personal account or advice to the rest of the world. Cat went first, discussing how difficult it was losing her friends one by one to the vicious creature, but how important it was to keep pushing on with what was left and what you did have. I added on to her ideas, including my experience with Tori's final moments in which I almost had a breakdown but luckily held myself together. Beck went last and a perfect finish to the entire interview.

"I thought I was going to die when my arm was bitten off. I really did. The Chillsnare's poison was damaging me from the inside, both physically and mentally. I didn't want to believe that there might actually be a way out, besides death. I wanted to give up.

"But my friends didn't let me. Even when I was on the brink of absolute madness, becoming an uncontrollable animal that was so set on a single idea it was impossible to change my mind. Because they didn't give up on me, I didn't give up after all either."

My husband took a deep breath, reaching with his prosthetic arm and taking my hand, linking our fingers together. His were cold and stiff but gently bent to fit between mine.

"No matter what happens, you can't surrender to the evil. No matter what."

He looked up from the paper to glance at Cat and me, and then the cameras, a smile erupting on his face. "I guess, the best way to sum this whole thing up would be this: Don't sleep until you're dead."

THE END.

Here's a fun fact on the story: Did you know that if you paid attention to these names (Jovian, Berglemir, Chillsnare) then you would've known from the start who lived in the end (and essentially who didn't)? Example: Jovian-Jade, Berglemir-Beck, Chillsnare-Cat. Those were the characters who survived. Sneaky, huh? ;)

I hope you enjoyed the story. No sequel, I'm sorry. But please feel free to re-read this until you understand all the other hints I left behind. :)

If anyone has any questions, comments, concerns, etc., go ahead and leave a review or PM me! I'll answer ASAP.

Thanks so much to everyone who stuck with this. You are all so awesome to me. :)