OK, here's the gist so far.  This is for the benefit of those having any trouble keeping it straight.  The time is now after Rwing passed out at the airlock.  This occurred about the same time Schala fell through the vent.  We now return to a normal flow of time, no jumping around. Sort of!

        Rwing groaned as he sat up. His entire body was throbbing.  At first he thought he was having problems with his eyes, then he realized that the entire corridor was bathed in the eerie green glow of the station’s emergency lights.  He wavered as he stood and put his hand on the wall for support.
        When he finally looked up he saw for the first time the mess that lay before him.  The entire floor was covered in dust and debris.  A strange greenish yellow slime was splattered throughout various places.  In some spots human blood gave a strange cast under the glow of the lights. Various weapons and body parts lay strewn about.  There had been a massive fight.  Whoever or whatever it was must have passed him up.
        Rwing looked down to see if his pistol was still at his side. Thankfully it was.  He unsnapped the holster and drew it, turning off the safety and checking the sight.  He walked back down the hall in the direction he had come.  His footsteps echoed as he walked.  The sound was slightly metallic.  In the distance he could here the hum of a back up generator.
    His communicator crackled,  “…port... anyone... me. This is...my friend... unconscious... has... sprained.... need... medical... we're... section 21... habitat....” The communicator quit. It sounded like a woman's voice, but he couldn’t make it out.  Rwing figured it must be his proximity to the generator.  They usually threw off interference when they were on.  He got away from it out into the main promenade.  The blood here was disgusting.  Several bodies lay unmoving, others were impaled by some strange spears, while others lay in pieces.  “Is anyone in here?”  His voice echoed about the room.  He stepped lightly as he made his way to a table in the food court and sat down.
        “...Port...can anyone hear me.”  Rwing picked up his communicator.  The voice on the other end sounded desperate.
        “Hello, this is Ensign Kevin Navets, I'm with security, do you read me.”
        “RWING, it’s me Kyle.”
        “KYLE, hey are you OK, what the hell happened?” Kyle had been Rwing’s best friend at the academy.  Everyone had called him Shark, because he often played cards and tended bar on the side of training.
        “ It’s not good, the buggers hit pretty hard. Half the main docking ring was taken with the assault and...”
        Rwing interrupted, “ Assault, what are you talking about?”
        “Where have you been for the last hour? Some strange aliens attacked, they hit most of the main rings and kidnapped a bunch of civilians.
Most of the crew was killed fighting.  We’ve been cut off from the command deck; I’m down in engineering. It’s bad down here.  It’s only me and two other engineers.  One of ‘em says we can get the defense drones active, but we have to reach the main security computer core in the vents by the habitat ring.”
        Rwing brightened, “Well first of all, I’ve been unconscious for the last hour.  The good news is, I’m in the habitat ring on the main promenade.”
        “WHAT! That’s great, see if you can reach the core.”
        “OK, but I wanna get to a security locker first and pick up some extra ammo. Not to mention a motion tracker for my helmet.”
        “OK, good luck. Call me again when you reach the core.”
        “Will do Shark.  It’s good ta hear from ya man.”
        “You too.”
    Rwing slipped his communicator into his pocket and picked his pistol back up.   He vowed to himself to make it through this fight alive, even though every fiber of his being screamed out in horror at the scene which lay before him. Standing, he crossed the promenade to the security office across from the food court.  Inside the room was a mess.
    The chief’s desk was shattered into three pieces and papers lay strewn about.  The monitors were smashed in.  The heavy-duty triple reinforced door to the security lockers was dented in a half inch with singe marks around the dent.  Rwing thought to himself that he would hate to meet the thing that dented that door.  He tried inputting his password, but the power to the door was off.  Bending down he opened a small panel and slid his hand through the manual override switch and pulled it as hard as he could.  The seal on the door hissed as it swung open, revealing several pieces of equipment.  He mounted a motion tracker to the display visor of his helmet, grabbed a backpack, and filled it with several extra clips of ammunition.  The weapons were kept in a separate storage area with higher security or he would have grabbed more.  With gun in hand, he strapped his helm on and activated the motion tracker.
    The readings horrified him; several blips showed as foreign or unknown life forms.  No human readings were picked up.

        “Repeat, can anyone hear me. This is Mara Wingard; my friend is unconscious and has a sprained wrist.  We need medical assistance. We're in section 21 Alpha, habitat ring.” Mara had been at the monitor for the last hour.  She barely had enough power to drain from the Elerian game she had rigged as a battery.  She didn’t even know if anyone was still alive.  Schala lay on the floor a few feet away on her back.  She had hit her head hard on the way down falling into a glass table.  Mara just thanked her luck that she hadn’t been hurt jumping down after her.
    She was even luckier that Schala had not been cut.
    She crossed the room and sat down in frustration.  The door out was blocked, and the vent above was too high to climb.  She at least thanked that the room was big.  Schala had once told her that she was afraid to die, but she never really showed it. Although, by the look frozen on her face now, Mara would be near tears if she hadn’t lived the life she had.  She wished she could cry out, but her mind wouldn’t let her. Coming from a poor family had made her proud.  Being a thief made her even prouder. A life constantly on the run had trained her to be silent even in times of trouble as to not be found out.  The fact she even tried to make a transmission went against everything she had ever lived for.  She sighed again, as she lay back and tried to sleep.

        Rwing surveyed the sight before him.  The hall was blocked off just at the door entrance to the Elerian Delegations quarters.  The only way to get to the core now was to climb through 5000 yards of vents and shafts, the entrance to which was on the other side of the station. He thought it was a good thing the Elerians weren’t here after all.  He couldn’t imagine how anyone would survive in a room, even of that size, alone until the mess could be cleared. Then it hit him; he couldn’t get to the core, but the air vents ran around the wreckage, even into the quarters.  He could simply climb around and at least reach the lift shafts that ran down as far as the engineering ring and as far up as the command deck. He ran back to the promenade and opened the entrance to the air vents and climbed in.
        Rwing crawled until he was almost to where he thought the quarters should be, but this couldn’t be it, the air was too wet.  He peered through the grate below.  A shadow of movement caught his eye ahead of him. He looked up and saw nothing.  Suddenly he heard a small noise like the flutter of wings followed by an animal like hiss.  Only, it was from behind him.  Rwing crawled ahead as far as he could.  An open grate stopped his movement, it was either try to crawl over and risk falling in or try to fight the thing behind him.  He reached for his pistol.
    As his fingers locked around it a small jolt shook the vent and he lost it as it dropped into the room below.  The thing hissed again.  Rwing screamed desperately as a searing pain shot into his leg.  Something was wrapping around it trying to pull him.  If only I had my pistol! The thought kept rolling through his head, but mixed into his thoughts and panic, in the back of his mind lingered one persistent thought which horrified him... I'M GOING TO DIE!

        Well, that's the third installment, stay tuned for the fourth which is already halfway through production.  Coming up, the first encounter with our story’s main villian. Be ready!