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Machine Protocol by AI Construct
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The Machine inside
Date: 7 October 2005, 1:55 am
AUTHORS NOTE: This is my first fan fiction, and also the first story ive written, please bare with me, I have not had much experience writing.
-------------------
1300 hours:
Pvt. jonathan M. ericson had been in the service for only a few months, he wasn't a strong willed person, but he wasn't a
push over.
He, pvt. mitchels, and captain (he wasn't really a captain, but he had a big ego, he never took offence, he knew he had one)
were sent to investigate a strange electrical sound eminating a few miles out.
it was a pretty terrain, the ring , at least for now, when the ship he served on, the 'In Amber Clad' had done a slip-space
jump with the covenant ship, and he had been sent down on a third wave, he had wanted to be sent down on the first wave
with the legandary Master Cheif. AS they drove by, I noticed somthing.
"Hey cap'n, take a look at the cliff face!"
Captain turned his head fast, but the thing was gone,
"what john, I don't see anything"
I shook my head, and set my rifle on my lap, "I could have swore i saw somthin', but maybe its just my eyes playin' tricks
on me".
Captain laughed and told me to get my head checked when we got back.
1320 Hours:
captain was hiding behind a rock about 10 feet away,and mitchels was behind a tree a few feet behind.
Captain signeled for us the move slowly, he then pulled out a frag, as did mitchels, I pulled out my sniper,
we were facing sentinals, about a good dozen of them in-fact.
Mitchels moved up the side of the cliff face, captain went down near the water, I took the enhancment chip for my sniper,
and plugged it in (the chip made the images of what I was aiming at appear in my head, giving me an advantage as a newer
recruit) About 14 feet away from the sentinal camp, mitchels and captain threw their frags repeatedly, one, two, one, two,
while I fired away.
The sentinals were slow on the uptake, about 4 of them had been detroyed, but when they did, they went after mitchels,
I took out two, but their beams of fire melted him as he screamed in pain.
Captain let out a roar of anger, and started firing with his assualt rifle, they moved faster now, and surronded him,
they melted his gun, then they started on him, and before I knew what had happened, two of my comrades, my friends,
had been melted, but captain hadn't died in vain.
"stupid sentinals!" I shouted, because when they had killed captain, they didn't realize what happens to a heated gernade.
a large explosion sounded, and when it cleared, I saw a sentinal rushing me, but it didn't have its fire beam, I threw a
frag and it exploded behind it, and then I realized my mistake.
And then I went down.
1400 hours:
I awoke with a head ache, it took me a moment to realize what had happened, andI sat there and stared.
About 15 minutes later, I came out of my daze, and realized that my enhancer chip had fallen out, and I saw it lying near me,
soI picked it up and put it in.
My head was on fire!
electricity shot through my head, it was like someone had taken a bomb and blown it up inside my skull!
Then, everything went dark, and I forgot who I was.
0900 hours:
I woke up in the make-shift infirmary, I sat up fast, and my head started hurting, and I realized it was bandaged.
"Good to see you up soldier" said a voice from the corner, I couldn't yet make out who it was.
The person then stood up, and the face of sargeant Adam T. Switoski shown in the dim lights of the tent, I tried to salute,
but I found my arm had been numbed and stitched up.
"its ok soldier, you were pretty banged up when we found you, what happened?" he asked "or are you still a little woozy
from the morphine."
I told him I was fine, and I told him what had happened in the last 20 hours.
when I finished the story, he frowned a bit, and nodded solemnly,
"they were good men, and damn fine marines, its a shame, but at least we didn't lose all three of you" he grined,
a sad grin, but it gave me hope.
A siren in my head started ringing and instantly, my numb hands went straight to it, large portions of information
started giong through my mind, containment protocol, enviroment variable, and alot of other things.
The sargeant stood up quickly, called for help and came over to me.
When I had stabalized, the sargeant chuckled,
"you gave me quite a scare there john."
I smiled,and then I started wondering,"sir," I asked, "whats happening to me?"
The sarge's face suddenly got serious, and he looked down at the ground,
"well, john, its hard to say, but I have to ask, did you put anything in your nearul implants?"
I closed my eyes, thinking hard,
"yes sir, my sniper enhancing chip"
he looked up, and then shook his head,
"john... that wasn't your sniper chip, it was a sentinal programming chip, we found them in the other sentinals around the
area"
I stared, and had a sudden sinking feeling, I started unwrapping my bandages,
"I don't think you want to...", he started saying, but it was too late, I touched where the nearul implants were, and tears
welled up in my eyes"
"Its true," said the sarge, "the chip has fused into your brain"
I fainted.
Oh where, oh where did this M6D come from
Date: 8 October 2005, 5:34 pm
1300 Hours:
I awoke with a splitting head-ache, I wasn't in the medic tent anymore, I was in a bunk, and I wasn't alone.
the man said smugly,"good afternoon sleeping beauty, you been out for a few hours."
I recognized the man's face instantly, Cpt. Anothony M. Wilkonson. He was a tall man, in his mid 20's,
with a face for smiling, bright green eyes, and some stubble on his chin that made him look like he had
forgotten to shave his 5 o'clock shadow.
"so, how you feelin'?" He asked, I gave a weak smile, and a nod, he continued smiling.
"so, do you have any idea whats going on?", I only shook my head.
"ok, i'll give you whats goin on so far, you put a sentinal chip into your neural implants, its screwed with your brain."
he continued to explain, how the sentinal chip put all the commands and the containment protocol the master cheif
had told command about when he returned to earth.
"So," he asked, "you hungry?"
2000 Hours:
After a good cold shower, and a hot meal, I felt alot better.
Everyone else in camp was supposed to be asleep, but tension was rising.
A message had been received a few hours earlier,a distress signal, a lone marine had been able to warn us about a force of
flood coming.
Everyone was worried.
I stared at my hands, wondering if I would be able to fight, the incident ealier, combined with the recent death of my two
friends, had my nerves shot.
"You awake john?" said anthony quietly,
"ya, just thinkin'" I replied.
"same here, what do you think is going to happen?"
I shook my head to myself, "I really know, I really dont."
0600 Hours:
I woke up, and shot straight up in my bed, I guess I had a nightmare.
I brought my hand up to my face, and rubbed my eyes, and when I brought my eyes down, I saw my hands were a sickly green,
and tenticles were sprouting out, I let out a screm.
"jonathon, JONATHON, WAKE UP!"
I sat straight up, anthony was next to me, he handed me an assualt rifle, I was still disoriented, but I recognized
things instantly.
Gunfire, yelling of commands, gernades.
I jumped out of bed, anthony on my right.
"Whats going on!?" I yelled over the gunfire of a passing squad,
"The flood are faster than the commanding officer thought, they got here hours before anyone predicted" yelled anthony
"GERNADE!!" a man yelled, I saw him grab his gernade, I saw him pull the pin, I saw the flood jump on him, and I ducked behind a
tent.
A blast sounded, I looked back around the tent, the flood, and the most of the group was gone, I saw a man, he was looking at
me, he called for help, I started forward, but the little floodling got to him first.
I ran as fast as I could, past firing squads, through tents, I stopped near the back of the camp, and got into firing
position with some 9 odd men, I fired, and fired.
For what seemed like a millenia, we fired at the flood, we fired at the flood when they went down, only when I ran out of ammo,
did I stop.
0730 Hours:
I sat there, catching my breath, only then did I take stock of what we had, four BRs, one AR, and 3 frags.
Only five out of the ten lived through the battle.
"Ok men," LCorp. Mary Perez said,"We are out numbered, outgunned, and maybe the only ones left alive! BUT! We will not
go down, and if we do, we will go down with our fingers on the trigger, and a smile on or faces, am I right marines!"
We all yelled a YES MA'AM in unison, and picked up our weapons, and headed out.
It took us a good 20 minutes, but we found more men, and to my relief, one of them was anthony.
"How you doin' kid?" he asked with a weak smile on his face, only then did I notice he was limping.
I ran over to him and supported him, "I'm doing just fine sir, although you look a bit ragged"
He gave a laugh, " ya well, I wasn't expecting flood to carry around an M6D Pistol."
I stopped, dead in my tracks.
"sir... those havn't been issued on our ship in eight months" I said shakily
We looked at each other, and then we moved faster.
Boomsticks and Picnics
Date: 10 October 2005, 10:06 pm
0830 Hours:
It didn't take long for us to peice our camp back together.
I had dropped Anthony off at the make-shift medics tent, he told me to go and check how the situation
was at the CP.
"come in" said the familiar voice of LCorp. Mary, who was now in charge.
I gave her a quick salute, and she gave me one back.
"So ma'am, whats the situation?" I asked, she sighed and shook her head, "Not good, First Lieutenant Ericson."
I was about to correct her, when I realized, that all of the people in the room were the same rank as I wused to be.
"ma'am.." I asked, "where are all the senior personel?" she sighed once again,and looked at me, "the flood hit here
first, john, they knew this was the CP"
I stood, shocked, but I got a hold on myself, "so, what are we going to do now?".
She stared at me a moment, clearly thinking, "we are to study our enemy for now."
I looked at her, and had an idea, "ma'am, I have one in mind, can we use that as a specimen?"
Her eyes lit up with curiosity, "you may"
I went off to get anthony.
1000 Hours:
"Are you shure thats it?" I asked him,"yes sir" said anthony, jokingly.
"Ok," I signiled to the research team behind me,"get it to the tent"
three men, all in white suits, stepped forward, and set down a body bag, then turned their attention to carefully lifting
the disturbing specimen into it.
1100 Hours:
The smells was horrible, but I was no longer afraid of them.
"would you like to do the honors sir?" asked the head of the Research team, he handed me the small plasma knife,I took it.
"make an incision along this line" he pointed to a black line over the heart, I took the small knife, and made the cut.
"what.... what is that" said a young nurse standing next to me.
"it looks like.." I began, but it started moving, and jumped out at my face, "woah!" I yelled.
In one swift motion, I took out my magnum, pointed and shot, the tiny thing popped, "get me the video out of the camera"
I ordered.
"sir, come take a look at this" said the surgen, I walked over to him, and he showed me a name tag, I read it aloud,
"Mendoza.." I thought about it a minute, "doesn't ring any bells, go to Col. Perez and ask her if we still
have records of all our troops, on the double!"
then it happened again, the high-pitched squeal inside my head, and then a flash back of sorts:
"143291", said a mechanical yet authoritave voice said,"please come forward." I floated foreward, and faced a small cube
of frozen gas, inside, was a perfectly preserved floodling, I floated forward more, it started to defrtost, I moved
backwards out of the containment area, and then a platform, with a small creature with a strange apparatus on its back
was set down, it moved around frightend, it tried to break the glass, but to no avail.
The floodling was finnaly defrosted, the first thing it did was start moving toward the only living thing,a
methane breathing species known as Unggoy, the small creature turned around just in time to see the small bubble-like
figure warp around its head and remove its mask, suffocating the creature.
The Unggoy fell dead, the floodling then ripped its way through the methane tank on the creatures back, and wormed its way
into its skin, and ....
and the noise stopped.
the research team surrounded me, I heard somewhere near-bye someone calling for a medic, I didn't black out this time,
the only thing keeping me from it, was a small, mechanical drone, that would have normally just sounded like a bunch
of sounds, but to me, it was a voice, and it told me things, about the flood, about itself, about the ringworld.
1800 Hours:
"The covenant want this area, we received word from Sgt. Switoski that there was a large force of covenant coming this way."
said Col. Perez, she took off her cap and scratched her head, "so, what do you guys think?" she asked.
I stepped forward, "ma'am, we should set up some trenches first, and use a quarter of our M19 SSMs, and put some S2 AMs on
the ridge up there", I said, thinking back a few months to my training. "Its a bit basic" she stopped, and throught a moment,
"but it just might work. Sergeant," she said, directing her order at switoski,"get your men ready and working",
"yes ma'am", he said, he saluted and left the tent to prepare.
"john", she said,"I want you to help me plan our defense", she smiled,"yes ma'am" I said, giving her a smile,
she went to the back of her tent, and pulled out a really good sketching of the surrounding terrain, "so," she asked,
"lets get started."
1900 Hours:
"OK MEN," I yelled to my squad of launcher, "We camped in the same area the covenant wanted, with all the fresh air, green
grass, and tea cakes you can eat! So they want to get hostile, you men are the first line of defense!" I stopped pacing in
front of them, and faced then, "all we have, to support us, are those woosey pea shooters on the ridge, are we going to let
them out kill us!" in unison, they all yelled 'NO!', and I pulled up my weapon,"These, these are our BOOMSTICK, when we shoot
they go bang, and then we can all eat our crumpets and sip our tea! DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME!!" a loud and satisfying 'YES!'met
my ears, and I smiled, and got into position.
"that was a mighty good speech there john" said switoski, who loaded the first two rockets into the barrels, then he handed
me the launcher and helped me secure it to my shoulder, "you shure about this?" I asked him, "if we don't win this", he said,
"then I have to give the colnel my soda pop cap collection." he said, laughing, I gave him a quick smile, and turned and
opened the rockets scope.
Waking is Over-rated
Date: 18 October 2005, 4:13 am
0700 Hours:
Everyone was tired, the Covenant had stopped sometime in the middle of the night, only to pick up again a few hours before, and they were near, so near, you could see them now, the Ghosts were up front, then the Specters, and finally, two Wraiths. Everyone was wide awake now.
"Ok Sergeant, get ready to signal" I told him, he put his hand up, every loader looked toward him,
"Hold it....Hold it...." he said, his hand still in the air.
Its as if the ring was holding it's breath, waiting for the order to fire, the only noise that could be heard
was the low humming sound of the covenant vehicles, rapidly approaching.
"Almost in range..." he whispered to no one but himself, a trickle of sweat ran down the side of his cheek, he stared at the on-coming vehicles, like a mad man staring into the abyss.
He smiled, and said aloud, "Ok you sons of bitchs, time to die! FIRE!" his hand dropped.
The low humming sound, now a roar of Covenant machinery, was droned out by the sound of a couple dozen 102mm high-explosive
rockets that symbolized that we were not going down without a fight. The loud whistles of the flying projectiles were replaced
with large explosions, Ghosts, Specters, and earth all exploded in super-heated blue white flame. Even mroe to our suprise, because it had not been taken into account, many other vehicles exploded due to the fact that plasma gernades were very unstable.
We fired a second volley, more Ghosts and Specters exploded, creating a smoke-screen in front of us.
Then,as we smiled at each other, a large plasma ball come from the smoke, we heard the ball hit somehwhere behind us, and we knew, that we had not hit the Wraiths, we had only given them cover.
Elites and Brutes came charging from out of the smoke, firing like mad-men at us, some were hit, their cries cut short by the super-heated plasma.
Suddenly, a loud roar made up by smaller roars rolled down the valley from the ridge above, I was worried for a moment, thinking the Covenant had blind-sided us, but to my and a few other marines relief, it was only our snipers.
The roars scared the smaller grunts, but not the Wraiths, who, with the loud noises of our snipers, fired at their position, and soon, the rest of the marines and I, were the last line of defense, a grim thought, but true non the less.
The Sergeant raised his voice yelling orders to get the rocket launchers reloaded, and take out the wraiths and ghosts, but a few of us grabbed up our ARs and BRs, and ran forward, most of us running like like all hell was behind us, but, if anyone knew anything, we wern't running from hell, we were running forward to embrace it.
Rockets, plasma, and lead wizzed by as I raced forward to meet the enemy. I stopped a few yards in front of a few elites
and a brutes, pulled out a frag, and yelled, "Grenade!", to warn anyone near by.
I threw it, but my hand was shakey, and it was a bit off, but today was my lucky day, I wasn't off by much.
Two of the Elites went down, some shrapnel hit the Brute in the back of the head, effectivally punching its way through the brutes face, the last Elite was only saved by his sheild, I saw my chance, dropped to one knee, and fired a controled burst into the belly of the beast, the dying scream turned into a gurgle, as it fell and choked on its own blood.
All of a sudden, it fell earily silent, and the death-like smoke cleared, and before me, the wraith appeared, as silent as a ghost, it glided towards me, stopping only a few meters away, and the two small plasma turrets both set their sights on me, I could almost hear the pilot chuckle to himself.
All of a sudden, a projectile passed near me, and went straight into the Wraith, another followed, the shockwaves throwing me back. I watched from the air as the near god-like tank was reduced to nothing but a smoking and flaming shell, little left of it's former glory.
I hit the ground, all air left me. It took me a few moments to gather my thoughts, and I realized that while flying through the air, I had lost my AR, I got up, catching my breath, and took out my side-arm, only then, did I realize that, although one of the Wraiths was gone, the other was not, and it had just fired.
The sky lit up as the ball passed over Covenant and Marine alike, and came crashing down on the last of the launchers, I only looked a moment, but it was all I needed, ever Marine between the Wraith and the now dead launchers, started fighting with renewed vigor.
"Lets get them!" I shouted to no one but myself, and grabbed a dead Elite's plasma rifle, and started firing at anything that moved, I found myself ducking behind an overturned ghost, waiting for the last Wraith to pass by, as it did, I overturned the ghost, and hopped in.
The slow moving Wraith was no match for the Ghost, I came up beside the massive beast, taking two of the plasma gernades strapped to the side of the Ghost, activated them, and threw them at the Wraith, nad moved away as fast as the thing could go.
I didn't get far enough I suppose, because as soon as I heard the explosions of the plasma gernades, the Ghost went nose first into the ground, the final explosion of the Wraith sent the small vehicle head over heels, and it threw me out.
I landed on my back, and through the dust, I saw men cheering, the sun shown through the smoke, and Switoski walked up to me, smiling from ear to ear, "Sleepin on the job I see, you lazy b*stard" he said, I chuckled, "Just help me up" I said, he put out his hand, and I grabbed it, and he helped me to my feet.
For the rest of the day, and well into the night, laughter, and just plain happiness emminated from the camp. Morale was high, because during this small and meaningless battle, we, and the Covenant realized somthing,
We could win.
Two Step
Date: 3 February 2006, 6:12 am
1000 Hours
It had been two days since the attack. The feeling of glory and carelessness had passed, and the reality of their situation had moved back in.
"So, Switoski, how is the 'injury'", I asked jokingly.
"Haha, very funny, if I could get up, I would put my boot so far up your ass....",
a groan cut through as Switoski saw one of the MPs come up, holding a needle.
"You can take friendly fire in the ass, but not a needle? You wuss.", I said to him, the MP stared at me a moment, and asked me if I would like a shot, a quick no and I left.
A man came up to me as I was walking towards my bunk,
"Sir, Col. Perez wants you at the main tent, please follow me", I was confused, because I knew where the CP was.
"Whats going on?", I asked the man, slightly confused.
"I can't tell you here, just follow me, and try to stay out of sight.", the man said, and began to walk faster.
1030 Hours
"Ericson!" yelled Col. Perez, "What the hell took you so long?",
I began to give an excuse, but she waved it off.
"Nevermind, Just get in here, we have some new information on that specimen you brought in."
She noticed that I was looking around at the area, obviously confused why they had moved the CP.
"It has to do with the information that we found, please, follow me.", she began walking towards a small cave entrance I hadn't noticed before, I stopped and looked around once again.
The CP was set up right underneath an outcrop of rock, and a few interlinking caves pockmarked the bottom of the plateau, the scorch marks from the wraith's blast still lingered at the top, a grim reminder of how powerful the covenant actually was.
"Ericsom!",she yelled again, "hurry up, we don't have alot of time."
1045 Hours
A holo-image appeared in the middle of the small, circular table, the image was that of the human/flood-specimen, or, it was dubbed HF-1.
A man in a white coat appeared in front of the table, pushing a button, HF-1 appeared full size on the table, and the man proceeded to tell his disturbing new information.
"I'de like to begin by welcoming you all here...", "Stow it, Stockheed, you said you had important information, so spit it out." said Perez.
The man, Stockheed, gave her a sharp glance, and got straight to the point.
"Well, as I was saying, the reason I asked you all here, is because of the information we have found on HF-1."
He tapped a series of buttons, and the holo-image of HF-1 dissolved, and a picture of HF-1's open cranium appear, a few people turned away.
"The specimen's skull remained mostly the same, except the brain had been taken over, but that's not why I brought you here.." he touched another button,
and a screen poped up, and a video started playing:
HF-1 came up behind an unsuspecting marine scout, and hit him on th back of the head, instanly killing the poor marine.
A group of the smaller, orbed flood, surrounded the body, managing to flip it over, one of them proceeded to bury itself into the marines chest, they all watced in gorey detail as it took over, slowly.
After the transformation was complete, the newly made flood stood tall, and everyone held their breath as the newer flood led a few others through the human camp, avoiding everything, until they reached the origional CP. Stockheed turned off the feed right before the Senior officers were attacked.
"It seems," Stockheed said quietly, "That the flood can steal the host's memories."
The room became quiet, and I realized how cold it was in these caves.
Somewhere, I heard water dripping, and in the back of my mind, I heard the buzzing again, that high pitched squeal , and I knew the sentinal was listening intently, it sounded as if... as if it was laughing.
The water dripped again.
I looked up, Perez and Stockheed were arguing, butI couldn't hear a thing they were saying, only the dripping sound of water.
The water stopped.
All I could hear now, was somthing moving.
"Everyone out!", I yelled. Everyone looked up in suprise I yelled out again, and they started running.
Just as everyone had left, HF-1, now with a new little flood inside, came out from one of the side tunnels.
As it appeared, I pulled out a frag gernade, pulled the pin and dropped it.
Everyone had made it out just in time, the frag when off, and the honey-combed caves collapsed in on themselves, sucsessfully destroying HF-1 and any way the flood had gotten in.
Stockheed looked Horrified.
"What the hell do you think your doing?!" he yelled.
"Stockheed, QUIET!" yelled Col. Perez, she dusted herself off.
The sentinal only laughed.
"Ok, Ericson, get into camp, and tell your men to pack it up, this area might be comprimised."
And that was the second step on our journey.
The Machine Inside (Rewrite)
Date: 16 July 2007, 3:41 pm
1300 Hours:
Private Jonathan M. Ericson wasn't a huge man, so he shouldn't have been hungry. Jonathan, like many other proud patriots of Earth, was a thin man at around 5'11", with a head of thick black hair.
And, just like most of his friends, he had signed up for the Military. Now, a few months out of boot camp, and he was sitting in an M12 Warthog along side a few good friends from boot, on a giant alien construct known as a 'Halo'.
With him, on this most unimportant of scouting missions, was the egotistical and narcissistic Private William Henry. William was from England, and he was, for the most part, self absorbed. He want by the nickname Captain, because he wouldn't shut up about how he was going to be ours soon. Other than the need to be better than everyone else, he was an alright guy. Also with them was the lovable Gary Mitchels. Mitchels, like every large muscled man, was feared by many,but in reality, like so many large men in movies, he was just a caring man with a 6'5", 250 pound, well muscled body. He reminded me of those loving grandmas on all those old television shows, so I started calling him that.
As Captain drove along, I wandered off, looking at how beautiful the terrain was. As his mind wandered, he went over how they had gotten here on the Halo. After boot camp, a surprise assault by the Covenant had taken place. Captain, Grandma, and him had all been on the Malta to meet the famous Master Chief when the slip-space jump had been discovered. Soon, gunfighting and screaming could be heard all around. Then, just as fast as it started, it was over, and everyone who had a ship was ordered on it.
It was a mad house, jumping over dead human and Covenant, fighting what was left of the Covenant presence, and getting to the In Amber Clad before it took off. Pretty soon the IAC was on Earth, fighting the Covenant forces that had made it there, and right when the battle seemed to turn, the target Covenant ship was preparing to do a jump. The IAC jumped with it. And now he was here...
A flash of light woke me from my day dream.
"Hey Cap, did you see that?"
A confused look crossed his face, "See what?"
As we stopped, I told him about the flash of light.
"Well, this is a scouting mission, so we might as well check it out." Grandma said. Captain gave a quick shrug, and we turned toward where the light came from.
----
1320 Hours:
Grandma was behind what was left of the Warthog, and Captain was behind a rock with me.
Ten minutes after deciding to follow the light, we ran into a large group of Sentinels. Grandma took out a few with the turret, but we had to find some kind of shelter from their beam weapons. No sooner had we gotten out, the Warthog had caught fire and had a minor explosion.
The Sentinels were moving, and it was time to fight. Captain took a grenade and threw it, Grandma started shooting with his SMG, I rolled out from the rock and started aiming with my sniper rifle. With the first attack, we took our four or five.
The Sentinels, it seemed, had enough and charged Grandma. Captain and I took out as many as we could, but they were on him faster than we could take the out. As a final act, Grandma threw a grenade at his feet. It didn't do as much damage we thought it would have.
Captain and I let loose any grenades we had left, but the Sentinels still came. Captain was hit in the chest by one of the Sentinel's beams. He was dead before he hit the ground.
Suddenly I found myself alone against two Sentinels. I ditched my sniper and picked up Captains Battle Rifle. As the Sentinels got closer, I took one out, and damaged the other one's beam weapon. Then the Sentinel did something I did not think of.
The damn thing tackled me.
It knocked me clean out, and during that unconscious period, I felt extreme pain in my neck area, like it was on fire.
----
2000 Hours:
There was a faint light, then it got bigger and bigger until I could see where I was. Where I was, was a makeshift infirmary for the Military forces already on the wing.
"How you doing kid?" came a gruff voice from the corner of the tent. I tried to move, but I was strapped down.
"Don't move kid, you were pretty banged up when we found you. You're lucky to be alive as it is."
I tried to remember what had happened, but all I got was a headache.
"What happened sir?" I asked. The voice sighed, and a man came in to view.
He was tall, with the normal military short-cut. He was black, and muscular, not as muscular as Grandma....
It all flooded back in, and for a moment I was completely silent.
"They're all dead, aren't they...?" I asked. Another sigh, and the man shook his head in confirmation.
"There is no easy way to tell you this boy, but there is something else I must tell you." I was still in shock about Grandma and Captain, so a dull okay was all that came out of my mouth.
"When we found you, you were unconscious. You were badly bruised, with a few cuts and some broken bones. The most disturbing part, was that a Sentinel had attempted to connect with your neural interface. Unfortunately, it didn't work and it fused your interface with the machines connector. We were able to safely remove most of the metal outside your body, but we couldn't go inside without killing you..."
It took me a moment to go over what he said. At first I didn't understand, was it just physical damage, or had the Sentinel become a part of him? I wandered off again.
"...is going to give you a shot to put you to sleep for a while. Night kid." I felt a sharp prick in my arm, and the last thing I remember was that light going out.
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