Resistance and its universe are copyrighted to Insomniac Games. This story is strictly a work of fanfiction and will only be posted on different sites at the author's discretion.
Autumn 1951
Somewhere in Central Europe
I don't know how or why I've survived this long.
A chilly breeze prances across the rooftop where I take my post for the hour. I can effortlessly spot and track the figures patrolling on the street below, though the chill means my aim isn't as steady. I can see the old cathedral looming in the distance, a lonely relic of a fallen era. To its north is an even bigger monolith - swarming with activity as if it were a citadel to itself.
My light-winter uniform is that of a Spanish UED soldier, a Sergeant from its stripes, and its nametag reads "F. Viola." There are dried bloodstains around the collar, but they somehow match the old bricks.
This city belongs to no one. It hasn't belonged to anyone since the Great War. Not to me or anybody living here. Not to the Germans, not the Poles, not even the Russians.
Not even them.
The uniform isn't mine, either. I found "F. Viola's" beheaded corpse near the Polish Post Office a couple of days ago, and I was thankful for what I could get.
I've had the helmet for several months. It's cold, but the gas mask counters the chill. Its warmth comes with the condition of a putrid stench from constant use, and it doesn't protect me from poison gas.
The rifle's been mine since this morning. The sound of its discharge shatters the silence, and the bullet that it heralds plants itself between the two left eyes of the monster below.
A screech from its comrade tells me it's time to move again. Another crack of the rifle and that comrade falls to the ground as well. I breathe a heavy sigh - my last deep, putrid breath for the time being with this gas mask on - as I lean the rifle on the edge and make for the fire exit from whence I came. The rifle is empty anyway. Dead weight.
As I head down the dank staircase toward the ground floor, I remember again how everything seemed to fall apart.
My father was a decorated veteran of the Eastern Front. He was proud of me as a child, but I noticed he was always very bitter about the fact that I was born just after the city was taken from Germany. My mother didn't seem to mind that too much though. Still, he was adamant on signing the family up with the National Socialists, but she managed to convince him not to move us to Bavaria. Or maybe it was the cushy position that the UED offered him in nearby K nigsberg.
The last time I saw him was the day after they broke down the Russian Wall. He said there was something urgent up at headquarters, and then he quickly kissed me and my mother goodbye before dashing into a waiting convoy.
I don't even want to remember the last time I saw my mother.
Even if I had subscribed to the Socialists' far-flung ideas of racial "purity," I probably would have renounced them on the spot when I learned they slaughtered Jew and Aryan with equal voracity.
I can feel the dual pistols quivering in their holsters as I bolt across the street into the lobby of what was once an apartment building. They beg to be buried with the corpse of their former master, but they never object to taking out its colleagues, as long as they are properly fed.
The lobby isn't quiet. I can hear something crawling and skittering, but not in front or around me.
I remember the first time I saw one of the invaders, and I was thankful that it was dead at the time. If it were alive at the time I would have never found enough time to be scared.
Fortunately, now is not that time. As the wall-crawler above me prepares to alert its comrades I draw one of the pistols just a bit and turn it upward so that it fires right into the machinery on its back. I manage to sever a few steam pipes, causing the creature to scream as it starts to overheat. Unfortunately, a cry of pain is more ominous than a call to arms.
With one desperate attack it drops onto me, tripping me forward onto the floor. I manage to keep a grip on the guns and muster the strength to get up, and thankfully the wall-crawler doesn't do the same.
I empty the rest of the pistol cartridge into it before making my way out the back door and into the alleys. A nearby door provides sufficient cover from a squad of invader footsoldiers - not unlike the one I had sniped - that I notice crossing the street at the end of the alley, and they are quickly eluded.
The basement of the building that I enter after this one is my refuge, and I end up trudging into these spartan accomodations, having been wearied out from the earlier impact.
It isn't much. There's a bed, a light, a radio, a couple of tables, and a back room where whatever's left of the food I've stored continues to mold in its cans.
On the table are various blocks of metal forming a small yet crude heap of junk. I had gathered them off the corpses of the invaders over the last few weeks. I have a general idea of exactly what they do, but unless they can keep a human like me cool during the summer heat, the only thing I can do is figure out how to apply them elsewhere.
Human summers, of course, have long since passed, so right now they are just various blocks of metal in a crude heap of junk.
I toss my gas mask and sidearms onto the bed and breathe a silent gasp of relatively untainted air before sitting down on the mattress.
The radio crackles softly. More stories about a heroic American soldier who somehow caused each and every one of the invaders in England to die off by blowing up their angels' tower. News that warrants a sarcastic smirk. It was old news - but real news - that the entire American force was wiped out not too long after landing. No doubt that desperate times called for more passionate and outlandish propaganda.
I doubt it would be long before the radio broadcasts are reduced to the same haunting loop they heard from Russia before they invaded.
As soon as the radio goes silent, I lean back onto the mattress and try to close my eyes.
A couple of hacking coughs rising from my throat reminds me to stop by one of the resistance's city shelters when I wake up for supplies. That is, if there's any resistance left if and when I wake up.
I don't know why I'm still alive anymore, either.
It is when I hear the screeching response of crickets that I realize far too late that I've left my safehouse door just slightly ajar.
I bolt to a nearby wall and grab the flamethrower's nozzle barrel from off the shelf. I fumble just trying to switch on the ignition, wasting precious seconds long since lost.
I finally pull the trigger, unleashing a torrent of fire at the crack under the door where the roaches are flooding in, cutting their advance in half and probably blocking off all the rest.
The flamethrower's nozzle clatters to the floor and the flame goes out as I make one last attempt to lunge for my gas mask, but I am stopped before I even start.
I flail and cringe as the roaches effortlessly swarm up my legs and chest, seeping into my clothing. I close my eyes and clench my jaw shut but they manage to get in through my nose.
As quickly as they get in, my body starts to shut off. My outer extremities - fingers and toes - go almost instantly, followed the limbs they are attached to. My jaw goes limp, letting them inside once again. I land sprawled across the floor within seconds, unable to even retch, scream or cry out from the numbness that engulfs me.
The most horrific part about it all was that my sight died out just after I heard my last breath, though I'll never be sure sure if I just blacked out or the roaches bit off the nerves behind the eyes.
Either way, I am a dead man.
I died alone, and it is a welcome release after so long.
In the darkness I see an angel. It is grotesque and hideous, even more monstrous than any of the creatures I've encountered so far. It hovers close to me and then embraces me with its horrific appendages.
Without uttering a noise it tells me why I've lived as long as I did.
And all at once...it is beautiful.