Makο Posted June 23, 2015 Report Share Posted June 23, 2015 Basically, part of a story I wrote when I was 14. 9000+ words of teenage sci-fi writing. Decided to post it because I'm bored. [spoiler=I can't remember the exact inspiration behind why I called it "Splint". Also, it's a direct copy-pasta from a 4-year-old word doc, so be warned] Splint Rated M Blood and GorePrologue Intense Violence Time……11:34 p.m.Date……August 13, 2147Aboard Military ship Chrome HuntersLocation…………Error. Please access crafts main terminal and correct the malfunction. “Blast it!” yelled Cameron, “This computers circuits are fried. There’s a bug in the system.”“Are you sure?” Damion asked.“Does it look like I’d be kidding with you right now?” he yelled.“Well, we can never be too careful!” Damion yelled back. But I could only just hear any of their conversation over the sound of my own Fusion rifle, franticly trying to hold off the approaching hostiles. As I carelessly sprayed bullets down the hallway, I glanced down at my rifles screen. Eighty-two shots left, I thought, that’s hardly enough to keep firing for another ten seconds. Then I started to panic.“Anytime now!” I screamed at my teammates, just trying to talk over my rifle. It’s only a matter of time before those things get us. Only a matter of time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Time……6:27 a.m.Date……August 12, 2147Aboard Military ship Chrome HuntersLocation……Officially 397 Miles away from targeted destination.Time remaining until arrival……10 minutesCommencing landing sequence… “And that’s how you win a card game, while cheating, and hopping on one foot.” Damion sat there with a blank look on his face staring at Cameron. I didn’t say anything. Seymore was the first to speak up.“How the heck does that make any sense what so ever?” he asked in his typical British accent.“It doesn’t!” Cameron yelled, and then burst out into a hysterical fit of laughter. All I could do was continue cleaning my Fusion rifle. Seymore sat there with an angry, but rather confused, face, and Damion just kept staring. To be perfectly honest, it is easy to make a profile on these people. Cameron, who is the leader, is big, proud, and confident, though a bit headstrong. He’s about 6’3”, with light brown hair in a buzz cut, and wore the Standard Military Outfit, issued by the Protectorate, which is the leading military force in the Galaxy. The suit had white as the base color. It had every safety device you can imagine, from large shoulder pads to crotch pads. Damion is the silent type, though a wiz when it comes to weapons. He knows every type of weapon that exists in the Galactic Front. He is 5’11”, with black hair that he always wore in outward spikes. He wore the same suit as Cameron, since it was Military Issued.Honestly, I haven’t been with Seymore, who is new, long enough to make a profile, although I’m pretty sure he’s at least part British, due to his accent.“Where are we headed, anyway?” asked Damion when he finally spoke up.“We’re supposed to be headed to some sort of a mining colony on Arcadia,” explained Cameron.Seymore looked shocked.“So, let me get this straight. We’re going to an old mining colony, out in the middle of nowhere, just to protect a bunch of worthless colonists? We’re soldiers, not security guards! We should be out on the front lines, fighting off the Rebels of Mondagore!”Cameron suddenly snapped at him.“Worthless? Worthless? WORTHLESS? Those so-called worthless colonists collect enough minerals to create 926 Omanary-Class Battleships. And that’s how much they get in a year.” Seymore just sat silent. “Well,” I said, “We have been getting a lot of tough jobs lately. Just think of this as a vacation!”“Yea, I’d rather be here than back on “The Devils Claw”. I’m pretty sure the Rebels had us back there,” Damion said. While everyone else continued talking, I went down to the troops quarters. Most of them were Spanish. I could tell when I over heard their conversation.“¿Usted sabe sobre ese individou de Socom?”“Yea, lo he visto”“Socom es un perdedor.” After hearing that, I had to speak up.“Hey! I can hear you in there!” Then I went back up to the bridge. As soon as I got up there, the intercom suddenly turned on and the Artificial Intelligence (AI) spoke to us.“Landing in exactly 5 minutes and 58 seconds………” The AI suddenly went silent. Seymore was a little confused.“Is your AI ok? Does it have a problem or something?”After about 2 minutes, red lights went off with a blaring alarm that went off at the same time. Then the AI spoke up again.“INCOMING PROJECTILE. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY.” Time……6:34 a.m.Date……August 12, 2147Location……Officially 136 Miles away from targeted destination.Time remaining until arrival……3:29IMPACT IMMINENT. MASSIVE LIFE SIGNS DETECTED. “What?” I yelled. Then I ran over to the ships’ main consol and did a scan of the surrounding area of 100 miles. The scanners picked up a massive object about the size of the ship. Seymore, who was looking over my shoulder at the time, grew scared.“Are you sure, Socom? Do the scans again. Do you think the Rebels are after us?” Damion, who had already grabbed his Fusion rifle, said, “It will do you no good. This ship makes its calculations flawle…wait, what? Your name is Socom?” Irritated, I said, “Yes, it is, but don’t you think we should be focusing on the matter at hand?”“I guess so…” Then Cameron spoke up.“According to my calculations, this…this…biomass of some sort will hit in 10 seconds!”Seymore stared at Cameron.“Biomass?” he questioned, “So it’s NOT a Rebel craft.” All I could do was yell.“BRACE FOR IMPACT!” Time……6:36 a.m.Date……August 12, 2147Location……………ERROR|INCOMING VESSEL CORRUPTING SYSTEMS When the biomass collided with the ship, I suspected the ship would crack under the enormous pressure applied by the biomass. But the ship was still in one piece, which made no sense at all.“Damage report!” yelled Cameron.“According to the AI, there is only a breach on sub-level 4, but nothing else.” Cameron didn’t look too impressed with Seymore’s report. Suddenly, the lights on the bridge flickered off. And to make matters worse, we could hear shuffling in the vents.“Well, this is creepy,” Cameron, exclaimed. Seymore had wide eyes like he had just seen a ghost, while Damion just sat there staring like usual. Though my face didn’t admit it, my heart was throbbing, unable to determine what might happen next. Cameron, being in charge, didn’t waste any more time.“Seymore, go down to the troops quarters and tell all the men to prepare for combat. Socom, go and unlock the armory. Damion, your with me.”I turned around to say something to Seymore, but he had already moved out. Just as I grabbed my Fusion rifle, we heard a scream coming from down the hall. We all ran down the hall just to find Seymore’s body being dragged up a vent by some sort of red silk. Cameron, Damion, and I opened fire on the source. The source let out a shriek before letting Seymore go and running down the vent. Damion kept firing while Cameron and I went over to Seymore. After checking his pulse, Cameron came to his decision.“He’s dead,” he said quite bluntly. It was then that I realized that this was going to be a difficult conflict. Time……6:39 a.m.Date……August 12, 2147Location…………System MaLFUncTioN | PleASE CorRect for ti..sdasdfswefgsddgsdgdhdshdthsrsrtsrgff…………………. As we were pondering over what was going on, I noticed that Seymore was twitching. I yelled,“Guys! He might still be alive!” So we all rushed over to him as he continued twitching. Then all of the sudden he flailed up on his feet then started to swing his arms around. During all of that, I could here the slightest whisper.“Shoot…me…” Apparently, my other team members heard it to.“What?” Cameron said.“SHOOT ME!” Seymore screamed as huge spikes shot out of his shoulders, stomach, and upper left leg. Then his skin started to bubble, his head got lurched forward, and his chest practically exploded, exposing his horribly mutated insides. Not waiting around to find out what was next, Damion pulled out his FSL (Fusion Shell Launcher) and blew off the entire upper half of Seymore’s remains. After watching something so horrible, I started hoping that Damion was going to use his FSL on me. But I quickly shook the thought out of my head and started to come up with a battle plan.“If one of those things can turn a human into that, we had best warn the rest of the crew about what those things are capable of.”“Wise decision, oh master of the obvious.” joked Damion in a sarcastic voice. Cameron, ignoring Damion’s sarcasm, went to the nearest CPU terminal and turned on a live video feed of the troops quarters. When it turned on, I managed to hear Cameron whisper something.“Oh my…”I turned my attention towards the screen just to see every troop on camera in a mutated form not unlike Seymore’s. Suddenly, one of the troops came out of nowhere on the screen, screamed into it, and then ripped the camera off the hinges with his mouth. Just as the camera fell on the floor and started to lose power, we managed to see the troops start to run out of the room. Then the feed went dead. After seeing that, Damion was the only one to say something.“Crap.” fjw2……dhr*63nw2oiw&……August 12, 2147fhgigsuiosdifogeirsgfigdfigt8erg$#^3gsda…n0…[email protected] After about 1 minute of just staring, Damion started pinching himself.“What are you doing?” I asked.“Trying to wake up, because I know this horrid nightmare can’t be real.”“Knock it off, Damion. There are still two more troops quarters that have no video feeds. All we can do right now is head on over to those two areas. Hopefully, they have held out.” With a sound battle plan in mind we moved out. After a quick game of “Pick a number between 1 and 10”, I lost and had to go by myself to the troops quarters on the far side of our craft, near the right main gun. As I was moving down the hall that led to my destination, I watched the door blow outward, throwing small bits of flesh and debris. Three of those mutations, which I’ve unofficially dubbed “Splinters”, ran out, and charged towards me, scaring the crap out of me. I then spammed bullets down the hall at such a rate that most people would call it overkill.After the smoke cleared, I saw the three ripped up corpse lying motionless on the floor. I nonchalantly strolled down the hall and peeked into the door. It doesn’t take a genius to determine what went on in there. All troops were unmercifully murdered. There was nothing I could do there. My first thought was to go to the Armory and grab some weapons and ammo. But then, I had an alternate plan. I figured that we would need more help in the upcoming fight. Since the engineers had some combat experience, I decided to go down to the engine room and get them. After walking down to the engine room, I saw the engineers still in one piece. “Are you guys okay?” I asked.“Shaken, but not hurt.” After a quick situational update, one more question popped into my mind. After a quick look at my watch, and a few time comparisons, I realized that we should have landed more than 10 minutes ago. One of the engineers said that the impact knocked the ship off course, and that they are now in a free float. That’s just what we need, I thought. After Damion and Cameron came back with who was left, I gave a situational update. “Okay,” I started, “1st off, we are in free float. 2nd, we are the only remaining crew who isn’t infected. 3rd, All ship systems are offline and there is no way to restart them.”“Great,” smocked Damion. “Things can’t get any worse.”Suddenly, I heard a noise. A crack in the wall tore open, and it sucked one of our crewmembers out. We managed to close the blast door, and after a small recovery period, I grabbed Damion in the collar. “NEVER SAY THAT!” I yelled, “THINGS CAN ALWAYS GET WORSE!”Guess what? It did. Situational update canceled.Pow…erring dowwwnn… Before we had the meeting, we forgot to shut and shield the door. While trying to figure out how to get off the ship, the door burst open violently, taking out one of our troops in the process. Then at least a dozen of Splinters charged into the room, killing two more troops before they could react. The rest of us grabbed what weapons we had and started to blast as many splinters as we could get in our sights. A small skirmish later, and we had 4 losses.“Terrific,” Damion commented, “It’s been 30 minutes since that biomass collided with our ship and already we have lost three-fourths of our troops and crew.”“Alright,” started Cameron, “now getting to the armory is a priority. We need heavy weapons.” He took out a coin. “Alright guys, heads or tails.”“Tails.” Said Damion.“That leaves heads for me.” I said. I lost, so Cameron told me to go and secure the armory. A long walk, plus a few skirmishes and close calls, and the armory was within reach. But nothing is that easy in this conflict. Right as I was about to open the armory door, I noticed the “Intruder” light flashing. Just in case, I decided to activate the security feed from a nearby console. Boy, was I glad I did. Inside the room, there were more than 10 splinters who were harvesting pieces of flesh from nearby security guards. I have to find a way to get those things out, or kill them. I looked around. I noticed a Fusion grenade lying on the ground. After picking it up, I glimpsed a nearby grate on a vent that was loose. Using the butt of my gun, I knocked it off the vent. Then I checked the console. Hmm…the vent exits into the armory. I pulled the pin on the grenade, chucked it through the vent and ducked beside the door. The blast was so viscous that it blew the door out. I checked the room. The only thing I saw were intact weapons crates and the smoldering bodies of those splinters. I grinned. Not a bad job. But then I noticed that there would be no way for me to get those crates to the engine room without help. After pondering the situation for a few minutes, I saw a conveyer belt on the wall. I quickly checked the console. This conveyer leads right to the engine room. I then pushed some crates on the conveyer. FSLs, check. Fusion Rifles, check. Fusion grenades, check. Medkits, Fusion pistols, Sonic Trip mines, check. I also put on some Fusion Shotguns, AX-1 Handheld RailGuns and Energy Staffs. That should be enough to fend off an army. I activated the conveyer and hopped on. After going down a small tunnel, I saw that I was in the middle of the ships main cargo bay, which was a huge cavern of conveyers leading to various parts of the ship. About four seconds after entering the bay, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. Just as I turned to look, a splinter knocked itself, the box with the Fusion shotguns, and me off the conveyer. I hit the ground. Hard. About three inches away from a pit with various gears and mechanisms. One foot to the left and I would have been chopped, diced and grinded to bits. Suddenly the splinter leaped on top of me, and tried to impale me with its huge spikes growing out of its body. I struggled with it for what seemed to be the longest 30 seconds of my life. Finally, I threw it into the pit filled with gears. I looked in just to see it get grinded into a big pulpy mess. I got up and grabbed as much Fusion shotgun ammo as I could and prepared for my trek back to the engine room. Well, at least the other weapons reached my friends. Lets just hope they survive the day. The trek to the engine room was not an easy one. Almost every turn there would be a splinter or two waiting for me. I could never let my guard down for even a second, because one false move could be my last. It felt like a thousand years before I saw the next human being. Unfortunately, that human was just a corpse on the floor. I noticed something on the floor next to him. I could not believe my luck. It was a Handheld NT-9 Chain Gun, one of the most powerful portable weapons in existence. I picked it up and checked the ammo count. Full? The splinters must have got him by surprise. Feeling like a champion, I walked down the hall holding the NT-9 up high. Pretty soon, I had a chance to use it. Coming down the hall were three Needlings, which were even more mutated versions of splinters. They had hundreds of miniature needles poking out of their backs, which totally disgusts me. I then sprayed bullets down the hall at an enormous rate. In no time flat those things were just stains on the wall. Its scary how those things are able to climb on ceilings and walls. But it’s just something I have to deal with. It kind of makes me think that my life sucks. But in other line of work can you do the mass bullet spray that I can? I finally reached the engine room. But when I showed up, the sight was horrific. At least ten of ours were dead, with three wounded. That leaves only Cameron, Damion, and I that are still in battle ready condition. There were hundreds of bullet and rocket shells on the ground. There was nothing left in the hall, because all of it has been blasted away.“Well,” Cameron started, “There is nothing left for us here. We should go to the escape pods and jettison down to the planet. Hopefully, it’s a lot safer down there than it is here.” We all agreed with his plan. There was no reason to argue. There really is no reason to be up here. So we gathered what ammo we could and moved out. I could feel that the journey from here to the escape pods, with the nursing of the injured troops and fighting the splinters, was not going to be an easy journey. We started down the hall, which had blast scorches on it from the rockets. It smelled of burning flesh and blood. This is not a job for the weak stomach. We kept on walking, stopping every now and then to tend to the wounded. Then we kept on walking. We haven’t seen any splinters for a while, so I disarmed my NT-9 to prevent a misfire. Big mistake. Just as the escape pods were in view, a large group of splinters charged down the hall from both directions. We were stuck at the pods now. “Get those things open!” I yelled. I had no time to rearm my NT-9, so I took out my Fusion Rifle and started to spray bullets down the hall. As I was spraying bullets down the hall, I looked around for a quick situational update. I noticed that a splinter flanked us and was ripping apart two of our injured men, while a needling dropped from the ceiling and speared our last troop. Cameron and Damion had finally got the door open.“And not a moment to soon. Get inside!” We all scrambled in, just as the splinters were closing in. When the door shut, already we could feel the splinters trying to break in. We didn’t have much time.“Were going to eject!” We jettisoned from the ship and aimed for the planet. As we moved towards the planet, I saw our ship eject something. Than it began tracking us!“Incoming!” I yelled. We shuttered when object hit. “Were going to crash!” Damion yelled. Way to state the obvious, Damion. As we were hurtling towards the planet, I noticed our ship changing direction as well. They’re following us? How the heck??? At this rate, I figure none of us will make it out alive. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~PART 2~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As we pierced the thick atmosphere of Arcadia, I could see that our escape pod was falling apart. “Buckle up boys, cause were in for a tough landing,” said Cameron. Leave it to him to comment during a comment-less situation. He began a countdown until impact.“10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1...” The impact of the pod was so violent that we were flung all around the cabin, snapping our harnesses. I was knocked out… “Socom…Socom…Socom!” I awoke to the sound of Cameron yelling my name into my ear. I jerked my head up, only to realize that I had a headache.“Thank goodness! I was starting to think I was the only one left.”“What do you mean?” I said, still trying to shake of my headache.“Well, by the look of things, Damion died upon impact.”“What?”“Well, that’s only as far as the evidence goes.” Suddenly something caught my eye. It looked like a meteorite. But on closer inspection, I was horrified by what it was. The Chrome Hunter. It was on a crash course with the planets surface. Saying that was bad news is under exaggerating. We needed to find the local settlement and fast if we are going to survive this fight. As we started to gather what remaining supplies we had, Cameron spoke up.“You know, I can’t help but think…”“That’s a first.”“Shut up. As I was saying, I can’t help but think that those splinters remind me of something. Creatures from an old game I found lying around. I think the game was called Starc…” Before he could finish his sentence, a purplish blob fell from the sky, with such an impact that it knocked both of us over. I hopped up on my feet only to have a splinter jump on me and knock me over again. Now where have I done this before? I through it off and took out a small volentistaff from my boot and stabbed it, over and over again. No sense taking chances. “Isn’t that a little overkill?” Cameron was already back on his feet, and he was gathering firewood.“Um…what are you doing?”“What does it look like? I’m gathering firewood.”“Why?”“Well, were going to be here a while, aren’t we?”“Yea, but in the colonists city, remember?”“Oh…yea.” And with that, he dropped the wood and grabbed his Fusion Rifle.“In that case, we should get moving. Its getting dark, and I don’t want to be stuck out here with the splinters and whatever else may live on this planet.” After grabbing what we could from the escape pod, we started out into the unknown. Just as we were losing site of our pod, I remembered something.“Hey, wait a minute. I forgot something.”“Well, hurry up. We don’t have all day,” Cameron called back, annoyed. I ran to the pod to take Damion’s dog tags. But when I got there, I made a startling discovery. Damion’s corpse was gone! I looked around in vain. He was nowhere to be seen. Puzzled, I started to walk back to Cameron.“Well? Did you get what you wanted?” he asked.“Not exactly…”“Whatever, we have got to get moving.” And we did. But first, we had had to make a plan. I took out a scanner drone and tossed it in the air. It shot up high into the air and started scanning the surrounding area. I held up the halo-disc it was connected to. It projected a map of the surrounding area.“Ok,” I started, “First we need to cross this canyon here, then make our way through this forest here, and then we will be at the colony.” With that plan in mind, we headed out to our first obstacle: the canyon. “Ok,” panted Cameron, “The canyon is just over that hill. Phew! If I knew this job would take me here, I would have said I’m to old for this.”“But Cameron,” I said, “Your only 32. And you DID know. We were headed to this planet in the first place.”“Still…” After a short climb up the hill, we saw the canyon in all of its glory.“Umm…Socom? Has it occurred to you that this canyon is way out of our league?” He was right. It was almost twice as long as the Grand Canyon back on Earth. At least until it got filled. After a quick look around, I saw a tram/cable car that led across the canyon.“Hey, why don’t we just use that?” I said, pointing. So we got on and activated it.“Jeez,” commented Cameron, “This car must be hundreds of years old. I hope it holds.” Well, it did. About half an hour of mind numbingly boring waiting, and we could see the other side. But just then, we heard a shrill screeching sound. We looked out the window to see hundreds, no, thousands of infested flying creatures following us. In my own opinion, they are just oversized bats with spikes. But now was no time to think. I had to lock and load! I grabbed my NT-9 and open fired behind us. I must have taken out hundreds of them before I had to reload.“You know,” yelled Cameron over our own gunfire, “Back on Sacian, we would ride these things as transportation.”“Not to be rude or anything,” I yelled back, “But right now, I DON’T CARE!” The trams consol read that we would be arriving at the other side in approximately 1:34. We just had to hold out until then. Suddenly a missile raced pasted my head at breakneck speeds. At that very moment, thousands of things were racing through my head. Was that meant for us? Are the colonists hostile? Are they infected? When I looked back up, I saw that more and more missiles were flying towards us. But they were flying past us. They were headed straight towards the Bats. I looked at the other side of the canyon.“AAAML-162’s. Automated Anti-Air Missile Launchers,” Cameron said, “Apparently these Bats were a problem before they were infected, and so the locals set up the Turrets to keep them at bay.” Thank you locals. To bad at this rate I wont be able to thank them in person. When we reached the end of the canyon, we ran towards cover, and then sprinted into the forest. One obstacle down, one more to go. We were about ten meters away from the canyon inside the forest before we realized where we were.“Hold it,” I said, “We should really examine our surroundings before we move on.”“No time,” Cameron yelled as he ran ahead, “We can’t let those things catch us.” What could I do? He was in charge and he is very demanding. If you don’t listen to him he’s liable to shoot your fool head off. So I sprinted after him. We had gone through about a mile of tough, overgrown under brush. I must have gotten at least three leaches and two ticks while walking through. Not fun. Anyway, we came across a small open field in the forest.“We should rest here,” Cameron wisely said. We had been running for hours and hours without a break. We were running low on stamina, as well as food. As we were resting, were heard a deep, LOUD growling noise.“What was that?” I said, a little worried.“Well, whatever it is, I’ve never heard it before.” After we heard the roar, we could hear some rumbling in the ground. I could hear trees crashing down. I started to get worried. Suddenly, I saw the largest creature I have ever seen. It was a large, four-legged creature. About Ten stories tall, with six large Razor-Sharp talons coming out of its head. And it was headed straight towards us in a frenzied panic.“Out of the way!” Cameron yelled. We managed to jump out of the way just in time.“Jeez,” Cameron began, “What do you think could have caused it to be frightened that much?” I looked over my shoulder. I was just able to see the creature turn around, and head at us again.“Uhh…I don’t think it was just frightened,” I said in a minor panic. It let out a huge roar and put its head down like a bull as it was charging. I let my NT-9 Chain gun loose on it. But the bullets just bounced off him!“What? Impossible!” I yelled. I rolled out of the way as it charged by. Cameron open fired on it with his fusion rifle, but to no avail. I had to come up with a way to kill this thing. And fast. I looked around. I saw a nearby cliff hanging over the clearing we were in. Hmm…that is almost to good to be true! I checked my belt. Only three grenades…that means I only have three chances to get this right! I unclipped one from my belt. I ran over to the cliffs side and yelled,“HEY! BIG, FAT, AND STUPID! OVER HERE!” Apparently, that beast is intelligent enough to understand human speech. It turned towards me, fire in its eyes, ready to rip me apart. It charged for me, roaring and snorting like a bull on steroids. As soon as it was within five feet of the cliff, I rolled out of the way, throwing the grenade at the top of the cliff. The cliff exploded, sending a rain of huge boulders and rocks on top of the creature, which I’ve officially dubbed, “Necrobull”. It let out one huge roar as its final dying breath was let out.“Well,” started Cameron, who was climbing out of the bush that he had dived into, “That was fun.”“I still can’t believe I got the cliff in one shot,” I said in my own disbelief, looking up at the destroyed cliff.“Well, you were just lucky.”“I don’t believe in luck…” I muttered as we continued on our way. I could see it. The end of the forest! It opened up to a large area. The ground was red, not unlike the surface of Mars. The opening had a boulder here and there, but nothing to catch my interest. We began walking through the plain, but with every step I took, I felt the ever-growing sensation that someone was watching me. As a precaution, I looked over my shoulder every other step. Apparently, I wasn’t as inconspicuous as I thought I was.“Hey, calm down. We’re in the home stretch! The colony is just over that hill. We can just use their cargo transport to evacuate who ever is left. We have nothing to worry about!” said Cameron, in an assuring way. He jinxed us. Suddenly, a spear flew about 3 inches from my head. Stunned, I looked around, aiming my Fusion Rifle at the surrounding cliffs. I managed to see something poke up ever so slightly.“There!” I yelled, unleashing a storm of bullets towards the area. Cameron did the same, but not fast enough. Another spear soared from that general direction, going straight through his shoulder.“ARRRGH!” He yelled, obviously in pain. I glanced at him.“Keep shooting!” He shouted at me, “I’m fine!” So I opened up on the source again. But then something amazing happened. I heard a voice.“Wait!”If I didn’t know better, I would have thought that was a young girls voice! I guess I don’t. A girl, around the age of thirteen or fourteen, came skidding down the hill. She hopped down, stopped in front of us, and leaned on a spear she was holding. She was about 4’10”, dark in skin color, probably Jamaican in origin. She wore an oversized Traders outfit, and had goggles on here head. Her hair was black, in a style that made it look like she had two large rings circling her head, slanting outward. I wonder how long it takes to keep her hair like that…“Hi! I’m Tanya!” She said with a grin on her face. She looked over to Cameron, who was lying on the ground pooling blood, and her grin vanished.“Umm…” She started, “I can explain…”“You had better! Right now, give me one good reason why I shouldn’t put a bullet between your eyes!” Cameron yelled in a fit of rage. He was already aiming a pistol to her. I grabbed his gun.“Cameron, back off,” I turned my attention back to her, “When did you think it was a good idea to start throwing spears at us?”“Well, I was just doing what I was told…” She said, meekly. Hmm…she must be sensitive…we should be more careful… “Doing as you were told? Explain”“Come with me. I’ll explain everything once we reach camp.” After she said that, she went over to help Cameron up.“Don’t touch me!” Cameron snapped. She leaped back in surprise.“Ignore him,” I started, “He’s had a long day.”“Oh…ok…” She said quietly, staring down. As if trying to snap her self out of it, she looked up with a smile and said,“Come on! Camp is this way!” She hopped up the hill with surprising agility. I walked over to Cameron.“What’s with you? You just snapped at her like she was the most evil person in the galaxy!”“Did you she what she did? She sent a spear threw my shoulder!”“It was obviously a miss-understanding.”“I still don’t trust her…” I put his arm over my shoulder.“You’re only ticked that you got your butt kicked to you by a girl.” We started up the hill. About half way up, I realized.“Hey, Cameron. How was she able to throw the spear at that speed? I doubt either of us could throw it that fast.” My question was answered pretty quickly. We reached the top of the hill, and found what looked like a modified Grenade launcher with a pile of spears next to it.“Oh, of course. A spear launcher,” Cameron said, sarcastically. Did…did she make that by herself? We continued on, passing what looked like the corpuses of Splinters.“Apparently, the locals have already run into with these things,” I examined.“NO, REALLY?” Replied Cameron. “Did you think that little girl was shooting spears at us for no reason? I mean, come on!”“Oh, shut up.” We continued a little further. Then we saw what I had to assume was the “Camp” Tanya kept mentioning. It was a small collection of shacks made from various pieces of scrap metal. There was a fire in the middle of them. Around the fire were five people, all dressed in old and ragged clothes. I could see Tanya talking to one of them, an old, wrinkled man, who was also dark in skin color. I figured he was her grandfather or something. When she spotted Cameron and I, she ran over to us. “Welcome to our Camp!” She said in a very friendly way. I noticed that she was constantly looking at me, avoiding making any eye contact with Cameron. She must still be spooked by his rather…rough…way of talking to her. I’m not surprised. When angry, it’s not the best idea to cross Cameron. Anyway, she led us through the Shacks to the Main Medical building. Obviously for Cameron. The Main Medical building was just a normal shack, except painted white and with a red cross on the front. A nurse then came out, and put her hands to her hips.“Which one is the injured one?” she said. Cameron and I just looked at each other, while Tanya sighed and closed her eyes.“The one with the hole in his shoulder,” Tanya answered.“Oh, of course. Right this way.” She led Cameron into the tent.“Good luck with the nurse,” I said to him, winking.“Oh, crap…” Muttered Cameron as Tanya and I walked away.“All right…now that Cameron has received medical attention, you have some explaining to do.”Tanya flinched.“Explanation…right…oh, were to begin…” Her eyes widened. “I’ve got it! I’ll let Grandpa explain! Besides, he likes to tell stories.” Tanya took me to the elder near the fire that she was talking to earlier. “This is my Grandfather, or, as the other people around here call him, Winder. I just call him Grandpa.” I walked up to Winder.“Nice to meet you, Winder,” I said, shaking his hand.“The pleasures mine,” he said with a deep, raspy voice. He had a sagged face, in tattered and dirty clothes. He also had a fresh scar across his right arm. Doesn’t take much to figure out where that came from…“Now that the formalities are over, I have some questions,” I said, looking him straight in the eye.“Yes, I figured you might. Well, this is how it happened…” He sighed. It was about 1 week ago, or 2 Half Cycles. We were prospering, mining enough ore to create an Army the size of a city, 3 times over. Well, we figured the only problems we had were the local wildlife, and we had automated defenses to take care of them. We didn’t feel the need to carry any serious arms. Our mistake. At around 11:38 A.M. one morning, a giant flash in the sky blinded a lot of us temporarily. Once the flash faded, that’s when we saw it. A Huge chunk of what seemed to be a Biomass of some sort. It collided with our Capitol City of Antegria, and that’s when all hell broke loose…Those “Things” started slaughtering civilians and miners by the Hundreds, infesting and using the dead bodies afterward. We were overwhelmed, unable to fight back do to the huge lack of weapons in our arsenal. The local police force, using what limited weapons they did have, began to fight them off. But they were too much. As it seems, they were watching, learning, finding effective ways to repel our tactics. We had to escape the city, whether we liked it or not. Before we escaped, we raided the Local Security Militia Encampment. From it, we received small arms and ammo. Then we escaped the city via the underground tunnels that were used for transporting ore… “What you see here is all we have left. No large weapons, no trained personal, just minors and civilians. Tanya was lucky to find a Grenade Launcher that was smuggled on planet. With no grenades, she modified it to fire spears that we make from local plants. Now that you know what happened to us, I would like to know what happened to you,” He finished, pointing at me.“Us? Well, there isn’t much to tell. A smaller Biomass, containing those things, which I call Splinters, collided with our ship that was arriving here, since the Protectorate found this as a vital Military Installment. We came with a Serus-Class Interceptor, boasting large amount of weapons and land-based vehicles. But our ship was crippled when the mass collided, and we were unable to land and unload. The entire crew was infested as well, leaving Cameron, Damion, and myself stranded after our escape pod crashed. Damion died on impact, so Cameron and I decided we should find civilization.” Just as I finished talking, Cameron came over to us, with a large Tissue Restoration Device (TRD) over the hole in his shoulder.“Now, please explain that,” I asked, pointing at the TRD.“Ah, yes,” Winder sighed, “I am terribly sorry about that. But Tanya was just following orders. I have told her to attack anyone she didn’t recognize. The Splinters have been learning to limit the infestation, making their forces look more human. So we couldn’t take any chances. Again, I’m sorry. Its really my fault.” He looked at Cameron, and motioned towards Tanya.“I suppose I can let it slide for now. But believe me, I’ll be watching you,” He said with a hidden frown. Tanya still looked a little hurt from his harsh behavior. “Anyway, we need a plan,” I said, trying to break the tension.“Is your ship still in orbit?” Inquired Winder.“No, it isn’t. Somehow, the Splinters took control of our crippled ship and slammed it into the planet,” Cameron replied.“Didn’t you say that your ship was holding weapons and vehicles?”“Well, yea,” I looked at the expression in his eyes, “You aren’t really thinking of retrieving some of those weapons, are you?”“Maybe I am. Our initial analyses of the large Biomass indicated that a good 20% of it burned up in the atmosphere. If that’s the case, when your ship came in, the mass attached to it must of burned off, leaving little to no infestation left. Where did you see it crash?”“Well, judging on the distance we have walked so far, I estimate that it should be right over that hill,” I said, pointing to the right of me. Afterward, Winder sighed and put his hand to his face.“That is right were Antegria is located. In that case, we have to go straight into the mouth of hell and back. Well, lets move,” He said, retrieving his Pistol.I yelled to some of the nearby people, “Who wants to try and help us escape alive?” I received a few volunteers, but the rest stayed quiet. I’m not surprised. They have all had some traumatic experiences. I’m just wondering why half of them aren’t curled up in a corner, ranting like mad men. I grabbed my Fusion Rifle and set out. Cameron stayed behind, due to the Nurse’s order. Lucky… We had begun to move out when Tanya came running up from behind.“I want…I want to come too!” She panted. Winder put his hand on her shoulder and said,“I’m sorry, Tanya, but its far to dangerous. Just let us handle it.” Tanya put her hands at her hip.“This coming from the man who put me on guard duty by myself,” She said, sarcastically. Winder sighed.“Fine, you can come. But you must listen to everything I say.”Tanya, looking pleased, ran ahead with the others. I held back.“Why is she so eager to fight?” I asked as politely as I could.“Well, whether it’s for us or for revenge, I couldn’t tell. She lost her parents to the Splinters, so this might be a personal issue. She acts very cheery for someone who is in her position, and I’m all the family she has left,” He explained.“Oh…” I said looking down, but I looked right back up, saying, “Well, we have to get off-planet. There is no way for us to survive this. Are there any ships here with SFD (Space Flight Drive) engines?”Winder thought for a minute.“Well, there is one in dry-dock at Antegria, but…”“Perfect,” I said, “If we can get to that, we will make it off this rock!”“But it’s right next to the initial impact point of the Biomass.”My smile instantly faded. That’s going to be a problem… “Are you sure that there are no others?” I asked, hopefully.“Not that I know of. Although there have been rumors of a hanger bay created by smugglers, no one has ever found it,” He said, thinking.“Well, if we could find that, we would be able to evacuate without problem. By the way, I never caught your name.”“Its Socom,” I said, giving him a firm handshake. We continued a little further, until we saw it. Antegria. A large city of splendor, now a flaming and crumbling mess. Who knew that these things could cause so much damage…We could see the Chrome Hunter crashed on the outskirts of the city. Thank goodness for that. We could already see Tanya and the others rummaging through the wreckage. We rushed down to give a hand. Once we got there, Tanya came over.“Based on what we have looked through so far, nothing has survived the crash,” She said, dusting herself off.“Are you positive?” Winder inquired, while looking over her.“Of course I’m sure!” She said, irritated, “Come and take a look.”Winder and I walked over to the wreckage.“Mmhmm…ok…uh huh…Well, it looks like she’s right,” I said, looking around, “There is nothing we can salv…hold on. What’s this?” I walked over to a vertical slate of steel. I examine it for a minute.“Hey, guys,” I yelled, calling over to a few people, “Give me a hand with this thing.” We all lugged and tugged at it, eventually causing it to collapse. What we found behind it was astonishing. A Low Altitude High Capacity Transport (LAHCT, or Latch.). It was in almost perfect condition, obviously was stored in a Regenasteel container, preventing its destruction in atmosphere and impact. With 4 Rotor Blades to keep it aloft, 2 side mounted Fusion-MG turrets, and a Fusion-Core engine behind it all, its one of the most effective Air born assault crafts available. I was awestruck. Not by the fact that we had one, but by the fact that I didn’t KNOW that we had one. While everyone else had run over to inspect it, I walked over to Cameron.“Did you know we had this thing?” I asked, examining him for any sign of guilt.“Pfft, are you kidding? What don’t I know?”“Why you didn’t tell me about this,” I said, smirking at him.“There are some things in life people like you will never know…” He said, softly. Its stuff like that that confuses me. I scooted away from him, eventually breaking into a soft jog. I ran back over to the Latch.“All right, every one! Its time to pile in!” I yelled. I motioned Cameron to get inside. He shrugged, and strolled over, and got inside the Latch. I climbed into the pilots seat. “All systems go. Is everyone ready?” I yelled back.“Were good!” Tanya yelled back.“Powers on, fuel injectors pumping…and we’re off!” As I finished my sentence, the Latch began to rise in the air. It took a few seconds to fully lift off, but when it did, the Latch felt very smooth.“Alright, Winder. Where to next?” I asked.“Well, we should go back and pick up who is left right now. Then, I suggest we should find the Hidden Landing Bay, if it does exist.”“Alright then, 2 stops. On it.” I angled the Latch north, in the direction of the Camp. We were just within view of the camp, and what we saw was horrific. The camp was in flaming ruins, and from the height that we were at, we could see Splinters wandering around the camp, infesting any body left over. Winder sighed, while Tanya and the 3 remaining Miners stared in awe and horror.“Pull away,” Winder finally said, “There is nothing left for us here.”“Alright,” I replied, pulling the Latch away, “But where do we go from here?” Winder put his fist to his chin, in a very thoughtful position. He looked up with a fiery determination in his eyes.“Now, we make our final stand. We must locate the Smuggler Landing Bay. If we can do that, we might be able to get off-planet in one piece.”I checked our current position.“Where do you think the bay is?” I asked, still looking over my map.“We have heard that it is on the far side of the Chuu’Qariion canyon, in the wall.”Cameron looked up from his data pad.“You mean that huge canyon? That’s infested with giant Bat things?”“Yes, that one. The Coz Bats have been a constant problem, and I’m unsure of our defenses stats. For all we know, they could be smoked. That’s why, if it exists, the smugglers choose the canyon. We never go there.”“Well, if that’s the case, does that mean the smugglers put up defenses as well? I mean if they didn’t, those blood thirsty creeps would have killed them all, wouldn’t they?” Tanya asked, obviously not wanting to be left out.“We can only hope…” Winder sighed, looking back down. We were getting closer and closer to the predicted location of the Smugglers docking bay. The far side of the canyon. We came within view of a large, black cloud. I looked at it, questionably.“What…what is that?” I inquired. Winder stepped away from his turret, and stared at the cloud. His eyes widened.“No…no, no no! Quick, lower altitude!” He yelled, running back to his turret, “Get us out of its view!”“What? What?? What is it?” I asked, attempting to adjust altitude.“Those Coz bats. They’re highly evolved. They are able to fire proj-” Winder was cut off. Our Latch got hit in the side by a green missile. We spun out it mid air, before fishtailing and regaining steadiness.“Fire at them! Distract them long enough so that we may get away!” He said, spraying bullets in the general direction of the Coz bats. Several of them screeched and fell, but their allies fired more and more of those projectiles at us. We were hit once again and began to lose altitude.“Systems failing! One more hit and were gone!” I yelled, desperately trying to keep us steady. We were hit once again in the tail, and began to spin out once more. Except this time, it was lethal. Our now flaming Latch began to lose altitude, before completely exploding and falling. I held onto a nearby handle and held on for dear life. I peeked back at the rest. Tanya had here eyes closed, keeping her head down. Cameron was just trying to hang on, and Winder looked nauseated. I began to feel nauseated. I felt…I felt…I… I opened eyes, but saw hardly anything. It was blurry, so I could see nothing. I opened my eyes again, and saw fire. I opened once more, and feeling was back in his body. It was pain. But I could also feel myself being dragged. I looked around. I could see our Latch. It was in flames, smashed against the ground. The glass to the cockpit was broken, but I made nothing of it at the time. I could see 3 of the miners fighting with Fusion Rifles, but one got picked up and carried away. The others came running towards my position. I was being dragged away from the crash, I realized. It started to get dark. I noticed I was now in a cave. Gunfire, all around me. I tried to get up, but was pushed back down. I looked back around. I could see Cameron and Winder firing out of the cave. Who…who is pulling me? I looked up. I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was Tanya. She seemed to be struggling a bit, though. I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, a flash. Cameron had lobbed an EOI (Explode On Impact) Fusion Grenade. The EOI came in contact with the roof of the cave, and it detonated, causing it to cave in. Everyone else stopped firing, and looked around. All attention had turned back to me, now. The two extra Miners, Arnold and Firen, began to tend to my wounds. Tanya sat down for a rest. Cameron checked the caves entrance, while Winder sat next to me.“Would it be to much trouble as to ask what just happened?” I asked.Winder looked at me, intending to speak, but Cameron beat him to it.“Well, it was like this. When we were hit, we began to fall. We hit the ground, just missing the edge of the cliff. We all climbed out relatively unharmed, thanks to the safety measures on the Latch. We began to hold off the Coz bats, but with no hope of success. Firen noticed the nearby cave and suggested that we go run inside it. We began to make our get away, but that’s when Tanya noticed something. You were missing. We looked around, while Arnold and Firen held off the bats. Tanya was the one that found you, propelled half way out the windshield of the Latch. You had better be thankful for her stubborn spirit, other wise we would have left you behind, since we presumed you dead. It took us a good fifteen minutes to drag you over. I’m surprised that you are still alive, for being out for so long.” “I’m glad you had so much confidence in my ability to survive a crash.”“Yea, I should’a known better. Anyway, how are we going to out of here? The cave is blocked, and I don’t see any easy way to get out.” He said. I looked around. There was nothing around. No entrances, no rocks, features, anything! It was like a blank canvas. It was…to perfect. I stumbled up on my feet and walked to a wall. I rubbed my hand on it.“Smooth as glass!” I noticed.“Hmm…I have a feeling…” Tanya mumbled, walking towards the wall. She took Arnold’s Fusion Rifle on the way. She took careful aim and took a crack shot at one of the walls. Just like a hot knife through butter, it shot through the wall, leaving a clean hole in the wall. She dropped the rifle, and peered through the hole. I leaned closer to her, and whispered into her ear.“What do you see?”“Nothing. Its just pitch black.”“But that doesn’t make sense,” said Winder, who was dumbstruck, “The rocks in this area are hard as steel!”Cameron wandered over to the rock wall and knocked on it with his fist.“That’s because it’s not rock. It’s just a smooth ply woood, painted to look like the local rocks.”“But that would mean…”“Yes. The Smuggler Landing Bay is here,” Cameron concluded. and then they died idk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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