Argon Posted April 1, 2019 Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Chapter 0: Prologue. Spoiler The winter of 2298 on Terra was, well as we all know, a bad one. It's one most wish to strike from their minds, forget or just move on. It was our lowest moment for centuries and for any on earth it was soul sucking. Hopeless. I was afraid. I won't deny it. I'd been a Mobile Infantryman for years, I'd felt afraid but this time it was different. Stumbling through those streets of Poland It finally hit me. I was and would be alone. Nobody to laugh with. Nobody to be angry at. Nobody to hold. Just me, all alone. Lublin, the city I’d been wandering around in for a week, was hostile to say the least. My goal was to get out and push North-east. Safe to say I never finished that goal, but at the time my thinking was along the lines of, “urban areas are unsafe. Wilderness’ are safer.” But I was still mourning the loss of my friends. My brothers in arms. In the passing week I’d lost all of them. Either they went missing or they were killed. So it was just me. Wandering. Not thinking straight, trying to survive. To say I was broken was an understatement. I was shattered. So low I forgot what it was like to be high. The streets didn’t help with that mood. They were littered with debris, corpses and the glowing abominations. So holding my head together was an issue. For all my worth I kept moving from place to place, hiding the odd moment, simply because I should. Not because I wanted too. I was surviving because I didn’t know anything else. Death wasn’t an option, was it? So became my life; breaking into the cold pauses in history of old homes left untouched, rummaging through debris just hoping for just a bottle of water or packet of crisps, hiding under cars with baited breath, looting dead soldiers for bullets, MREs and clothes. From what I learnt from other survivors on earth, it was a similar experience for us all. That first month was the same. It’s all blurred but you did more hiding and looting whilst wallowing in self-pity and fear. It was the same thing on repeat everyday. That was until one fateful day. That's where I'll begin. The second I knew, I may not be as alone as I thought. My window full of Hope. Chapter 1: Week 1: A window full of Hope. Spoiler It was a sunny day after a night full of snow, so the melting ice reflected the light right into your eyes. A pretty morning in Lublin if you discounted the distant blasting of plasma or rising smoke stacks signaling the ever present danger. I’d just woken up and was heading north, sticking to the back streets, only crossing them after I knew I was clear to move. Look left and right before crossing kids. It’s important even in an apocalypse. I was running easy on food, a bunch of MI had died with their backpacks intact so that meant ammo and MREs for me. It was easy pickings to start and water wasn’t a problem during the winter. Take a bit of snow, stick it in your mouth. No my issue was the cold I’d just spent the night in it and even though the sun was out and burying it’s rays into my skin I was still very much cold to the bone. I wouldn’t know it for a while but I was tense. So tense I was going to ache for a week. I learned my true lesson on shelter that night and was paying my price that morning. This is important because of one of my many rules. Stores, Restaurants or supermarkets were a no go. It’s the first place you think of to get food and the Glow worms knew it. Often deploying sentries and partols nearby. But today I was desperate, sad and tired. So after crossing an intersection I bust into a general store. Well, I say bust but it was more an awkward stumble through the front door with my Mark one up. Probably had poor form and was graceless, Sarge would have been proud. I completed a small search and then cowered into one of the centre aisles, after shifting the broken glass in the door frame over to make anything enterings steps audible (You may not know this but Progenitors are sneaky buggers when they want to be, so any kind of indicators are useful). In my search I’d taken stole a couple jackets for warmth, a box of cereal to idly munch on and the latest copy of the federal times tboot. Something to pass the time and stop me from falling asleep. I must have just sat there out of the wind and bundled in my cocoon for at least a few hours whilst I read. It was an odd feeling reading about the reality you were living and reading it called ‘slim possibility’. By that I mean that the opening pages were all about the invasion. Must have been written day one, but it’s tone perturbed me, talking as if it would be a cake walk. That there were plans in place. That. That was all bullshit, and troop worth their salt would have knew that there was no plan from the orders given. SICON had no idea how to fight these things. They were caught as much off guard as the troops they ordered. It honestly sickened me. It was then in my thoughts and realisation I heard it outside. The light patter of feet beyond the threshold of the store. I picked up my gun with the utmost care. Not to make a sound. I aimed it towards the door, ready to pop anything that came around that shelf corner. I was kicking myself, I knew this was a bad idea. I knew I’d fucked up just for a bit or warmth. I knew I was gonna get hurt, die maybe. No that wasn’t an option but… that when he showed his face. Paws bumping up against the window frame. His little innocent eyes beaming in a ray of sunlight to splice at my pain. The little black labrador surviving just like me. Looking right at me as I stared at her. Utter disbelief. Now as a note I’d never been a fan of dogs. Don’t really know why but, I guess I never valued the loyalty. Least never till now. She changed my opinion in less than a second. I was desperately in need of something to emotionally lean on and she probably was just in it for the food but that didn’t change anything. She hopped down from the window and patterned into the stoor, over the glass and then into the aisle. I’d lowered my gun and still just sat there, a little hobo in a store being judged by the mutt in the street.The poor thing wandered by me as quiet as could be and huffed a sigh. Flopping over beside me. Closer inspection told me one thing, she was hungry, maybe thirsty. So I set around the store that Ache from the cold setting in as I found bags of pet food and something to use as a bowl. I ended up taking one of the scale bowls at the till for him. I gave her what I could and left her to feast whilst I just admired my newfound friend. Around her neck was a collar, a small circular pendant looped through it. It read one simple word. ‘Hope’. In total I spent two days in that store, recovering from the cold, letting the snow outside melt and testing my companion on commands. In which she seemed well versed. There was even a moment when one of the Glow worm Crab-walkers took a late night stroll down the adjacent street, to my suprise Hope hid. I say hid, she cowered and pissed herself. I don’t blame her, she didn’t understand what they were but she knew they were dangerous, which was good. Hope was smart. It was the third day that I got ready to leave. I resorted my kit, took a couple more bottles of water from the stores broken fridge and headed off, continuing north. A new sense of confidence and a friend. Chapter 2: Week 1: The First Firefight. Spoiler Travelling with Hope at my side made things easier. It also taught me a few things. A little fact, Progenitors only go out of their way to kill humans,not all the wild life. They’d only kill if animals if they got in their way or if they became food sources for humans, but that’s a story for later. I first noticed this the next time I’d ran into a group of Progenitors. Whilst I’d hid in a small alcove off of the street, Hope had ran out into the road. Yet the group didn’t shoot her, she ran back to me the poor girl, but they didn’t shoot at her. I don’t think I really realised what it meant in the moment. Part of me assumed it was luck. Alas myself and my friend continued on. Trying to push out of the city, piece by piece. Even if I’d only more three streets north every day, it was progress. My general mood had began to change too, I was happier. Actually that’s the wrong word, I was hopefully skeptical. Mainly because I had some being to talk at… even if she was a dog. She helped a lot. So days past, time when on. Streets were crossed, food was eaten. Until, I ran into the first true hurdle in my adventure. I didn’t realize until I’d done it but by going north, almost straight north, I was heading to the Federal office within Lublin. This was bad because of the ramped up numbers of Glow worms scouring the streets. It was too late though, I’d pushed into their circle of patrol and I only knew why when I say a street sign with the Federal logo and a directional arrow. I was kicking myself for days but I pushed on, I got more careful in my actions but I sped up my pace. All the way until I’d stooped into a house for the night. Hope wandered into the door frame behind, looking at me as her ever present expression begged the question, ‘Am I doing okay, Is this okay?’ and she was. Hell I’d argue she was doing better than me. “Come on. Get in so I can close the door.” I was practically whispering as I beckoned her inside. She did hop in, scurrying to search the house for food or a spot to sleep. While she did that I checked the windows, closed blinds and curtains making sure neither were moving unnaturally. Hope was still wandering around when I slumped onto the couch, a fresh layer of dust pillowing off of it when I landed. I let a legs hang off the end and set my Mark One and Backpack on the coffee table. Breaks from the now windy outside were few. I’d refused to sleep outside again, but was the inside of a dumpster really outside? So the comfort of a couch was nice, even if it was dusty. Hope wandered back in and took up a spot by the fireplace in the room, the lovable mutt knew what a fireplace was and she wanted it on. “I ain’t turning that on.” I informed her, watching those eyes loose a little glint, she hated being told no and I hated telling her no. Alas, I had too, a smoke stack from a chimney would have Thralls diving onto us. So we had to sit in the chilly room. Hoping it would heat up a little with us in the room. We sat in silence for the next few hours, both of us shifting every so often to stop a leg from falling asleep. Hell I was almost asleep then I was the light creep around the edge of the blinds. That blue torch ray marking danger. I waited for it to pass… It didn’t. One minute. Two. It didn’t move. I reached over, ever so slowly to grab my gun off of the table and that’s when the first shot went off. A bolt of plasma whipping through the window splattering molten glass and flames across the room. I rolled, off of the couch to duck any more shots to follow. They did follow. I did what I knew and aimed my gun at the window. Still staying small until they stopped shooting. When they the room was on fire, molten blue littering the walls and floor my dark hole now ablaze with that death defining blue light. My mind jumped to search for Hope who was nowhere to be seen. My heart skipped as I turned my attention back to the window. The curtains flames peeling away to show the pretty night sky. That’s when a new mass blocked them, a slight sliver of glowing blue on the humanoid. I pulled the trigger. Round after round entered it’s grey tumors, blue ichor splattering behind as they exited its body. After I would like to say ten shots it slumped back. The lifeless corpse slumping on the grass outside. I raised myself off of the floor to gaze outside and two more shots rained through the window frame. I returned fire and fled. Darting for the back door where I saw Hope cowering in a puddle of her own doing. My boot went into the lock and I ran. Over the fence in the backyard. Through the next house over and across the street. I ran and didn’t look back. The whole night I spent running. Everytime I thought I’d reached a moment where i could have a small breather I’d hear them. Their screeches hot on my tail. As was Hope, my now loyal companion running with me. Two peas in a pod. We defied the Glow as we ran into the night. // This is just something I'm spending some free time. It's planned to be a story about my new character Jane Evans and a long winded backstory. It's probably going to be trash but hey, we'll see where this goes. Aim is to add a chapter ever week if not every other. Thanks for reading.// Link to comment
Recommended Posts