Living Death

This is my other fan fic I made while I was at the HWF.

It wasn't as good as AvC, but it's on my long list of unfinished projects.

And please, no posting until all parts are posted.

LIVING DEATH

It was cold, way to cold. My whole body was freezing except for that one burning hole. I was running, running from an enemy I couldn’t see. But I could hear them. Oh god could I hear them. They were up in the air and they were closing fast. But they weren’t normal covenant Banshees, no, at least not the pilots. Heretics, just like every other covenant on this planet piloted them.

I had been here for about four weeks. I was dropped off here by a covenant cruiser and left to die. Just like everything else on this planet. They had been experimenting on me for the last eight months. I don’t know what they were experimenting for, but I guess they either found it or got tired of looking. What they didn’t know, is that the experimentation gave me regenerative abilities. This was probably the first time they’ve experimented on a human so they probably didn’t know what to expect. Or maybe they did, and once they realized they couldn’t kill me-

Right then a plasma bolt exploded just a few meters away, spraying snow and glass up into the air. I felt the heat wash over me as it knocked me off my feet. The other one strafed over me. I felt the burns as the plasma made contact with my skin and boiled it. I screamed in pain and rolled over in the snow. One of the banshees turned and came to a skidding halt, stopping three meters away from me. I watched, my eyes squinting in pain, as the pilot of the craft got out and slowly moved towards me. He raised his arm and I ducked my head, waiting for my hopefully quick death. It never came. I looked up to see that he was holding out his hand. I cautiously grabbed it, and he pulled me up.



TO BE CONTINUED…

LIVING DEATH

"So," asked the elite pilot in front of me, " why did you run in the first place?"

"Because two Banshees following and shooting at you isn’t exactly the most welcoming thing in the world." I replied. "Why were you shooting at me anyway?"

"You didn’t have a radio, so we couldn’t hail you. Besides, once we heard that you could regenerate, we decided this was the easiset way."

"Uh huh, but did you also hear that it hurts like hell when I do regenerate?" I winced in pain as I felt the pinpricks of my nerves slowly reforming under my newly regenerated skin. "Yeah, sorry about that. We-"

"Watch out," announced the pilot in the other Banshee. "Enemy AA fire in three…two…one-" just then, plasma bolts came up from the ground towards the two craft. The COM was still on "IM HIT!" cried the other pilot "left side burned, trying to stabilize…" there was a brief pause over the COM. "no good, I’m going down. Repeat, going do-" the COM went silent. I watched out the side of the cramped craft as AA plasma streaked up towards us. "Hold on, evasive maneuvers. I’m gonna try to accelerate out of here." I felt my self jolt as the craft sped forward, dodging left to right, trying to avoid the deadly blobs of energy. Then I felt another jolt. "Were hit! But it’s not that bad. I’m going to try and get us as close to our base as we can." The wounded Banshee moved faster now, dodging less and less plasma. "We’re leaving their range. Hold on, were going down!" I looked at the forward screen; we were headed towards an ice field. The Banshee jolted one last time; this time however was different. As it went forward, I went back and fell out, screaming all the way down the 150-meter cliff.

I opened my eyes. To my surprise, I saw my leg. It had been bent completely forward, from the knee, into my face. I moved, and pain spiked up the leg. But something was wrong. There wasn’t enough pain. It felt more like it was sprained rather than completely shattered. Interesting, maybe the constant experiments and injections had caused me to feel less pain then I should. I got up, ignoring the small amounts of pain, and limped over to a window.

I looked in, and saw guns. Lots and lots of guns. I felt along the snow-covered wall until I felt a doorknob. I turned it, and pushed open the fifteen-centimeter thick steel door and walked inside. The whole room was filled with guns. Old guns, newer guns, and guns I’ve never even seen before. I walked over and saw that they were in display cases. Apparently this was some kind of museum. I looked around and found that none of the guns had any ammo. I kept looking, and found a safe. Its lock was so corroded I just had to turn the handle to open it. I looked inside and saw an ancient 1940s Tommy gun and four extra 100 round box clips. I picked it up, it wasn’t an MA5B but it’ll do.





TO BE CONTINUED…

LIVING DEATH

I couldn’t see anything. There was only about four meters of visibility. The snowstorm had gotten worse since I first made my crash landing. I moved on, knowing that the Banshee I was in was heading in this direction. It was getting colder by the second. I could feel my skin starting to freeze.

Then, I felt something, something on the ground. It was vibrating. I felt the reverberations get faster and stronger until-

BOOM!

There was some kind of unseen wall next to me and out from the wall came a Hunter. The behemoth stood there for a moment, something was wrong about it. I could barley see it, just its outline.

That’s when I noticed. It didn’t have its gun or shield. It continued to stand there, moving its "head" around as if, as if it was looking for something. I stood perfectly still. I could feel my heart pounding like an assault rifle.

It started to turn to its left. I sighed with relief. Suddenly, as if it had heard me, it turned and directly faced me. I stared at it, frozen with fear. Praying that it couldn’t see me through the blinding layer of powdered snow between the two of us. But, as if to show me my luck had thrown me another curve ball, the storm rapidly died.

The Hunter spotted me immediately and swung its massive arm at me. I dodged it and ducked into a newly discovered short wall. I put my back to the wall and readied my Tommy Gun. Its arm punched straight through the reinforced concrete as if it were paper, missing me by mere centimeters. I got up while it was stuck and fired a short burst at the Hunter. The eight 50-caliber rounds bounced off the near invincible armor.

The angry beast lunged at me once again. This time though, it didn’t completely miss. I tried to dodge, but was too late. It tore a seven-centimeter gash in my right arm. I screamed in agony, but didn’t stop moving. I fired again, this time though, I the bullets hit home. I watched as the thirteen rounds tore into the Hunters midsection. But something was wrong. It was still standing.

I didn’t understand, normally that kind of damage would kill a hunter. I didn’t have time to ponder this because no sooner had it stood up than it swung its massive claw at me again. Rather than continue this game of hide and get killed however, I stood and fired a long string of bullets into it. It shuddered as most of the rounds tore through its neck. Orange blood splattered against the building behind it.

Finally, the once fearsome behemoth fell to the ground. I walked over and fired a coup de gras shot into it with the rest of my clip. I reloaded and walked away.
I had been wandering through the icy tundra for about six hours when I had come across a geological curiosity. Large pillars covered in snow and ice. I began walking thorough them looking around marveling at this strange phenomenon.

That’s when it came. I heard a huge crash. I turned around to see what it was and saw-

That’s when it came. I heard a huge crash. I turned around to see what it was and saw-
A Scarab. A large mining Scarab was looking directly at me. This time I didn’t have the blinding snow blanket or a superior weapon. I wasn’t scared though. If I ever live through this, I thought, I will never know fear again.

Its weapon began to heat and charge. "Come and get me," I muttered, "come and get me."





TO BE CONTINUED…

I felt the heat and vaporized snow splash over me as the Scarab fired its main cannon once again. I had been running from it for at least half an hour. Maneuvering through the tight columns of ice and stone, trying to survive. But it seemed that that every turn I took, every pillar I rounded, the machine easily matched my movements. And when it could not match me it simply smashed through the columns or took blind shots through them.
It was like playing chess with the Grim Reaper. One false move and I’m dead.
There was a loud crash and violent shaking in the ground. Another blind shot. This one however, was no where near me. Good, I thought, he’s getting sloppy. I rounded another column, ducked under another crashed one, and moved on to the next set of pillars. I moved through them, watching, listening to loud rumbling to my left.
I twitched as the gash in my right arm surged in pain. That was good, it meant the nerves were reforming. Since the six and a half hours I had gotten it the deep cut had slowly and numbly closed itself and sealed the seven-centimeter gap. Now was the second to final and most painful part of the regenerating process: the nerves. Shortly after that the new skin will form over where most people would have scars.
Another crash followed by much stronger reverberations. He had found me. The Scarab turned its weapon in my direction. It quickly began to heat. I ran and it fired, once again missing by a few meters. Except this time its smaller rapid-fire turrets began firing to. I dodged left to right, right to left. But a lucky shot hit me squarely in the back. I screamed in pain as the plasma impacted my bare skin. I fell to the ground, but quickly got back up. I couldn’t stop moving, not if I wanted to stay alive.
It fired its cannon again and sent me flying ten meters onto a pile of jagged ice. I fell right onto a sharp ice sickle and it impaled my torso. I felt the ice puncture my lung. I gasped for air. I got up, and immediately hunched over and spat blood onto the snow. I could barley move; I began drowning in my own blood. But then the blood left my lungs and the hole began to seal. I took a deep breath as my lung re-inflated.
Columns crashed directly behind me and were replaced by my relentless enemy. I ran, faster now. This time, I had a plan. I zigzagged through the columns towards my ultimate goal: the largest column. I kept running, the Scarab hot on my tail, but I was faster. I kept getting closer and closer until, I was directly in front of the column. I turned around just in time to see the Scarab stop and fire. I rolled to the right and the plasma impacted the foot of the column. It fell over and landed right on top of the Scarab.
I climbed up to a pocket in the side of a small mesa. I let out a long breath. I had won. I had finally beaten the Scarab. But something was wrong. The rubble shifted and rose and my enemy stood once more. I stood up. The Scarab got right up to the mesa until I was literally staring into the face of death. Its weapon warmed and was almost ready to fire when- "STOP!"
I realized my eyes were closed and I opened them. There was a figure moving up to the head of the Scarab. "David?" he asked. I looked at him.
"No, that’s… that’s impossible. Mark?" I said.
"Looks like we got a lot to catch up on."
"Yeah," I said, "it looks like we do."

TO BE CONTINUED...

"How much longer?" I asked as the Scarab moved through the rocky, icy tundra.
"About three hours" replied Mark. It had already been two hours since we left the pillars. Since then I had told him about the Covenant experimentation, the being captured by Banshees, the AA fire and fall from the Banshee, the finding the Tommy Gun, the fight with the hunter, the and the fight with his Scarab. But most importantly I told him about my ability to regenerate.
I coughed again; my lung still hadn’t completely healed. Over the last two hours the hole in my side had, for the most part, sealed, except for the skin. The skin was still forming over it. The lung, however was still healing. And it was having a terrible effect on my breathing.
Mark handed me a cooked rabbit leg. He had told me that rabbit meat was the only thing to eat around this part of the planet.
"Did I tell you how I got this thing?" asked mark as he chewed another hunk of rabbit meat. "No" I replied. "No you didn’t, how’d you do it?"
"Well, shortly after I got here a ship crashed. Which actually happens all the time on this planet because of a flawed covenant supply route."
"Really?" I interrupted.
"Yeah," he continued, "anyway, this ship crashed and me and my friends here," he pointed to the various Grunts and Jackals operating the Scarab, "scavenged it for parts and supplies. Well, turns out, it was a cargo ship carrying mining equipment."
"Wow," I said my mouth full of rabbit meat, "and it only had one Scarab?"
"Well, it did have more than one Scarab. But only one intact one. The rest were so damaged they weren’t even good for parts."
I looked around the deck and noticed something that wasn’t supposed to be there. "What are those?" I asked. "They’re Shades." replied Mark. "We welded them on after we found them in another part of the ship."
"Looks like this whole thing’s been bulked up." I remarked as I looked around the customized Scarab. "Yeah," Mark agreed, "enhanced motors and gyro-scopes, strengthened frame, more power cells for the AA turrets, and a full meter of extra armor. The whole thing was bulked up. We had to especially with the Drinols we’ve been seeing around here." I stopped eating.
"Drinols?" I asked. "What the hell’s a ‘Drinol’?"
"They’re bigger, and tougher than Hunters, and a helluva lot dumber."
"How’d they end up here?"
"From what I’ve heard, they were dropped off here by the Covenant after they were deemed ‘too dangerous for combat’"
Too dangerous for the Covenant? I thought.I thought.
"Wake up." whispered Mark as he shook me. I opened my eyes. It was dark out. There were no clouds now, and I could see the stars and the two moons of the planet. "What," I mumbled, " What’s going on?"
"You fell asleep. Come on, we should be there in less than an hour. And you need to see something." I got up, and wobbled towards the ramp to the lower deck. I still wasn’t completely woken up yet. Inside, there were even more Grunts and Jackals at the controls. I walked over to a radar screen. There were several red dots coming in on three sides. "What are those?" I asked as I scratched my head.
"Those," said mark as he dug through some sort of trunk. "are Drinols." He something out of the trunk. I took another look at the screen. There were at least two dozen dots closing fast. Mark walked over to the display on the other wall. "You remember that thing<" he said looking at the display. "that your uncle used to tell us," he looked to me. "‘If you’re goin’ to hell’" he quoted and threw me my Tommy Gun.
"’Then at least go down fighting’" I finished. I pulled back the hammer and walked up the ramp.
It was colder now, way colder than before. I could see my breath when I exhaled. The whole upper deck was abuzz with motion. Grunts climbed into shades, Jackals armed their shields and plasma pistols. They had all manner of covenant weapons: Plasma pistols and rifles, Needlers, plasma grenades, carbines, etc. Mark was hefting a huge Fuel Rod Gun, the kind that Hunters used. Mark had always been naturally strong; he was at least 6,2 and strong as an ox. He whistled, and the whole crew stopped and turned their attention to him. "Everyone pick a target and don’t fire until I give the order. I repeat: NOT UNTIL I GIVE THAT ORDER! If I see anyone fire a weapon before I give that order, so help me God, I will push you off this Scarab. Do I make myself clear?" A crescendo of alien tongues filled the air. "How do you know what they’re saying?" I asked.
"Translator." He yelled over the wind. "I’ll tell ya how I got that later." I nodded. The Drinols were traveling in groups of four. Most of them had one eye, but the ones that appeared to be in the lead had two. As they grew closer Mark yelled out "READY!" I raised my gun. "AIM!" I picked a target. "FIRE!"


TO BE CONTINUED…

So, I've been thinking of picking this back up some time.

I wasn't sure if I'd posted it here, but now that I know it is, I think I may continue it once I finish my current projects.