Shattered Remains.
No more room for Vanity.

Alana's hands were shaking. The mirror in front of her contained nothing but bones and scars. Trying her best to push on, she carefully continued to button up her shirt. Her eyes flickered down on her reflection. Under her exposed ribs was the knotted flesh of a wound. Cherry red on a blanket of paper-like skin. More shaking, and the buttons that helped conceal that scar seemed the hardest to fasten. It felt so wrong to be wearing something clean, something white. The colour white always reminded her of purity. Every memory of her mother had her wearing white. But Alana didn't feel pure or clean. She felt... lost? Dead? Afraid? Hell, even emotions were too much for her right now. All that she knew was that she wasn't quite... whole, anymore.

Alone with her thoughts, Alana felt choked by her own pessimism. She reached up to the frayed ends of her hair. Nothing but an inch stood on top of her head. She imagined how she used to comb her fingers through its chocolate curls, how soft it had been.

"I'm such an idiot," she whispered. It was stupid to think about frivolous things such as hair and appearance. Weren't there more important things to consider? Like the endless battle between her race and the Locust? She should have been just grateful to be alive.

But is there anything worth living for? She resentfully considered.

A heavy sigh was all she could muster under such inner turmoil. Perhaps she shouldn't be alone right now.

She reached down onto her bed and plucked the hat that was resting there. Hiding her vanity's shame under its thick woollen hide, she felt more reassured in her appearance. Not that anyone would have given a damn about it anyway.

The steel door that contained the room she was staying in screeched as she pulled it. Currently, Alana resided on one of the 16 evacuation boats. Her room was shared with 4 other women, as only same sex rooms were permitted. It wasn't a pleasant arrangement, as the boat smelled of rotting fish most of the time. Not to mention the occasional violent jerks from the sea and attacking locust were enough to make her want to empty her stomach. But it was better than nothing she supposed. People didn't bother her, in fact, most people kept themselves to themselves there. Which worked in Alana's favour.

On board the ship civilians were permitted only in their rooms and in the canteen. Apart from that, the Gears controlled the ship. Alana often saw them walking down the halls, in their clunky armour, carrying those barbaric guns. Despite the time that she lived in, Alana knew little about weaponry. All she knew was that some were small, some were big, some shot lasers and others were the offspring of a chainsaw and a gun. Like little demon baby guns.

Her dad had loved guns. One time he tried to teach her the mechanics of them, but she had been 13 at the time and had only wanted to help her mother bake. Like all stereotypical girls of that age. The irony was, 6 months after her dad's attempt E-Day had struck and there had been no better time for the mechanics of guns. She remembered COG trying to bestow order, while at the same time, she knew that like her, they had no idea what was going on. Confusion, blood, death... scarifies; these were the legacies of her time.

Stepping into the canteen was always an experience. Alana had been alone for quite sometime previous, so being greeted by 400 people and Gears was still new to her. The fact that the place had been dubbed the 'canteen' was also something strange. There were no chairs in the canteen, just walls for you to lean on and a floor for you to sit. Several tables had been set up at one end of the room, with vats of hot soup (if you could call it that) being served. As it was the afternoon, and she hadn't eaten previously, Alana joined the cue.

In front of her was the metal armour of a Gear. Like every other Gear she had encountered, this one towered over her like the very locust they fought against. Wide set shoulders, bulky legs, weapons dangling from every body part. Yep, this was a Gear in all his glory. The only thing different about this one was his matted indigo hair. She tilted her head upwards, to where the shaggy mass collected. From first glance you would swear it was black, but then the light hit the follicles and it was quite clearly of a bluely nature. It seemed so out of place on a Gear, so frivolous and unnecessary. She wondered what had processed him to do it and where he had found the means.

Bemused, and grateful for the distraction, Alana watched as the man in front turned towards the elderly man that was serving. "Don't suppose you got any cheese burgers back there? Aye old timer?" he smiled. She wasn't used to hearing humour, couldn't remember the last smile she had seen. His was a particularly friendly smile, even on his hardened face. A strong jaw, straight nose, war tanned skin. He couldn't have been much older than her, perhaps early thirties or so.

"Just soup, move along." The elder handed him a bowl and ushered him along.

"Aww man, you're no fun. No fun at all." She watched him laugh as he walked off towards a pack of Gears that had formed a circle over in the corner. They seemed happy to greet him as he walked over, like he was a close friend of theirs.

"Oi miss, do you want something or not?"

Alana jumped at the irate tone of the server. Up close she realised the old man only had one eye, the remainder glaring in her direction. From the claw shaped scars on his face, it didn't take a genius to figure out how he had lost it. "Sorry," she mumbled and quickly took the bowl of soup out of his hand. She looked down at her meal as she walked through the stiff faces of fellow evacuees. She didn't know which look more uninviting, the soup or the people. With the war more and more people had become concerned with only looking out for themselves. Alana never viewed this as selfish; she knew that most people had lost all their loved ones, so they had no choice but to look after themselves. But it was at times like this, when a friendly face was needed, that she wished the world was different.

Without meaning to do so, she took a seat near the blue-haired Gear that she had been watching before. Her back pressed against the cold steel of the canteens back wall, and from where she sat she could hear the conversation between the battle scarred men.

"Bullshit Hardmen," one of the men said.

"What! I'm telling you it's the truth, I saw him. I saw Marcus Fenix."

"Bullshit."

A robust gear chuckled at a younger troop's story. Over all there were 6 in the group, including the man from before. The larger one seemed to be in control, as he not only looked stronger, he also seemed the oldest, Alana guessed around late forties. The others ranged from a set of dark skinned twins, who looked around blue-haired's age to a bald burn victim, who had charcoaled skin on the back of his head. Lastly, there was of course the youngest, the story teller himself. He looked pale faced and boyish with a mop of curly brown hair, he couldn't have been older than twenty-one. Gears just seemed to be getting younger and younger in Alana's eyes.

"Fine, don't believe. I don't give a shit, I know I saw him. There was this blonde guy who called out his name and everything. I tried to talk to him but I think he was busy."

"What? Too busy to talk with the great Hardmen? Well shit, who've thought."

"Aww leave out, will you Tug? If the kid says he saw him, then he saw him." Blue-hair said, putting a hand on Hardmen's shoulder.

"Well look at that kid, your boyfriend Noah's sticking up for ya."

"Jealous Tug?" Blue-hair or Noah, grinned; now wrapping his arm around the kid's shoulder. The group burst into laughter and despite her, Alana allowed herself to smile.

"Attention!"

Alana blinked and looked up to find a collection of very official looking Gears standing at the entrance of the canteen. The room fell silent as all eyes trained on a dark featured man in front. Like the rest, he was a tall, strongly built man. But by the way he carried himself, hands joined behind his back, she could tell he was someone of authority. A commander perhaps? "Attention all civilians. As you may know we took a heavy hit last night by the locust. Our medical staff is under-handed and our causalities, well... to put it bluntly, over flowing." An image of savaged carcases and mutilated Gears flashed in front of Alana's eyes. She winced, nothing but blood and confusion.

"We require anyone with any medical knowledge or experience to report down to the infirmary to assist our staff. Your jobs will be handed out according to your skill. If you are able to assist, I request that step forward now. Anyone unsure that they qualify, my men are about to go around now. That is all." The man stepped back and allowed a group of helmet hooded Gears to fan out over the canteen.

A cold bead of sweat dripped down Alana's forehead. She knew that she qualified, in fact she had previously been a medic herself. However, the thought of seeing the mangled bodies. Hearing those tortured cries of pain. The dying hope in a young Gears eyes. Her blood ran cold at the thought. It was selfish of her to remain seated, even as those much less capable arose, but her cowardice was saving her from the insanity.

Scared, Alana abandoned her soup and got up to leave. She planned on locking herself in her room, away from the madness of war.

"Excuse me Miss?" a Gear asked from under his helmet.

Fuck. "Yes?" she answered lowly.

"Are you reporting to the—"

"Ohh I'm not sure I qualify," she stammered quickly before the Gear himself could finish. Alana hated lying, mostly because she knew she was bad at it.

"Do you have any prior experience medically?"

"Well..." Just lie, she told herself. But as the seconds collected painfully, she knew that what ever she said would be eyed with suspicion. "Well, I did work once in Berephus, during the attacks but..."

"Then you qualify, please report down to infirmary for task assignment."

Her heart sank, but she reluctantly agreed. The Gear nodded and continued to check that no one else was escaping their 'duties'.

As she climbed down the stairs towards the infirmary, she tried to convince herself that it wouldn't be nearly as bad as she feared. First of all, this was a boat not a city. The causalities couldn't nearly be as bad as those she had experienced in Berephus.

Right?

CircleFace: By all rights, I shouldn't even be writing this. But a few days ago I was watching my boyfriend play this game and I thought 'omg, that would be such a good setting for a story'. So all of today I've been wrestling with writing a story, watching the cutscenes and gameplay, researching and... God, it just got the best of me. So I'm posting this chapter and just seeing where this goes.

Now just as a warning, I'm no gamer. I don't have the eye coordination for the aiming and shit. SO, while I've been researching and trying to get this as right as possible, don't be afraid to point out any mistakes on my part. That doesn't mean you can flame, just you know, constructive flames. :]